IntelyCare Secures $10.8M Series A Funding to Tackle Nursing Shortages with AI-Powered Workforce Management Platform

VCBeat (WeChat ID: VCbeat) has learned that on November 1, 2018, IntelyCare announced the completion of a $10.8 million Series A financing round. The round was led by Leerink Revelation Partners, with participation from Longmeadow Capital and existing investors LRVHealth and Bill Mantzoukas. This funding brings IntelyCare’s total capital raised to $14 million. Halsted joined IntelyCare’s Board of Directors as part of this financing round.

IntelyCare will leverage this funding to develop intelligent workforce management solutions for post-acute care in healthcare facilities. By leveraging AI-driven precision matching technology, IntelyCare can eliminate the cumbersome, manual scheduling processes associated with acute care in healthcare institutions.

As the demand for nursing professionals continues to rise and aging baby boomers (the generation born between 1946 and 1964, following World War II) drive increasing care needs, healthcare institutions across China are facing a significant challenge of nursing shortages. In fact, according to projections by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, there will be a shortage of nearly 1.2 million registered nurses by 2022, with gaps in nursing services spanning home care, long-term care, outpatient care, and rehabilitation work.

Due to understaffing and an insufficient number of nurses required for shifts, healthcare institutions spend a significant amount of time on scheduling every day. Administrators and schedulers are forced to continually plead with staff to work extra overtime to fill vacant shifts, while also recruiting additional personnel to address nursing shortages.

IntelyCare helps healthcare organizations optimize their existing nursing staff and supplement them as needed. With a deep understanding of nurses’ and facilities’ needs, IntelyCare leverages an intelligent matching and pricing engine platform to minimize manual involvement while delivering a seamless solution to nursing shortages. Scheduling information can be entered up to six hours in advance, and predictive analytics enable the forecasting of potential nurse shortages weeks ahead, allowing for immediate fulfillment when shortages occur.

IntelyCare is an industry leader in addressing nursing shortages. Its core offerings include: healthcare institutions can streamline planning and budgeting by paying a fixed fee to leverage IntelyCare’s services, while nurse compensation is dynamically priced based on the difficulty of filling specific shifts. IntelyCare incorporates dozens of data elements and over 600,000 observations—including past behaviors, shift times, medical specialties and certifications, geographic location, pay rates, and familiarity with facilities—into its analytical models to ultimately provide nurses with the most acceptable scheduling options.

Other features and benefits of the IntelyCare platform include: Automated billing—IntelyCare’s application uses geofencing technology to calculate nurses’ clock-in and clock-out times, enabling direct payment of wages to the respective nurses; Hassle-free compliance—Healthcare facilities are often required to provide regulatory authorities with complete profiles and credentials for every nursing professional working at their locations. IntelyCare’s online dashboard offers real-time workforce credentialing and downloadable profiles, allowing healthcare facilities to quickly and accurately submit the necessary documentation for relevant nursing staff; Higher-quality nursing talent—IntelyCare gains insights into the needs of both individual nurses and healthcare facilities through interactive engagement and leverages its rating system to provide proactive feedback, thereby enabling real-time updates to its intelligent matching algorithm. Nurses can work where they prefer, and healthcare facilities can secure the nursing staff they need.

Image from the IntelyCare official website

Scott Halsted, Managing Partner at Leerink Revelation Partners, stated that data from healthcare industry analysts show the temporary staffing market in the healthcare sector is worth up to $17 billion. The biggest problem is that most current solutions are merely stopgap measures, akin to using a band-aid to treat a large wound. Rather than filling shifts on a transactional basis, IntelyCare offers a permanent solution that will become an integral part of future healthcare facility management. IntelyCare’s intelligent matching engine can extend into areas beyond the reach of traditional staffing agencies, and by integrating nursing professionals into the gig economy, it will play a key role in addressing staff shortages.

IntelyCare, founded in 2014 and headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, specializes in developing intelligent workforce management solutions for acute care in healthcare institutions. Leveraging its AI-powered smart matching technology, IntelyCare precisely understands the needs of healthcare facilities and nursing professionals, thereby enhancing patient care through automated optimization and staffing augmentation.