Sunona
Clinical notes made effortless with voice-driven AI technology.
Introduction
At Sunona, we envision a future with effortless interactions between patients and healthcare providers. In today's healthcare landscape, providers allocate nearly 50% of their workday to medical documentation. Much of this time is spent during patient visits, requiring providers to multitask between typing on a computer and interacting with their patient. This divided attention can leave patients isolated and clinicians overwhelmed. Our voice-driven AI technology eliminates the barrier of medical documentation by autogenerating clinical notes in real-time, so that providers can focus on patients and patients can feel heard by their providers.
We are a dedicated team of 15 students from MIT who have been working on this initiative since January 2023. We have begun implementing our AI-powered solution in clinics and are actively receiving feedback from providers as we refine our tech and grow our business. These efforts have been supported by MIT's Venture Mentoring Service (VMS) and the BU Law Clinic, and were recognized in the 2023 MIT PKG Social Innovation Challenge. Recently, we were accepted into and participated in the Z Fellows cohort (<1% acceptance rate), where we were mentored by leading San Francisco-based entrepreneurs and VCs, including Kevin Hartz, Edward Lando, Prasanna Sankar, and Joshua Browder.
Problem
In the demanding life of a healthcare provider, each day follows a tight schedule. Arriving at the clinic at 8:00 AM, the provider prepares to see a continuous stream of patients, often 30 patients or more in a single day. During each visit, they welcome the patient, turn to their computer, and carefully document the interaction, often with little eye-contact or genuine conversation.
This routine leaves providers with significant burdens at the end of the day: burnout along with hours of remaining medical documentation that must be completed either that night or over the weekend. Time that could have been spent with family or on personal pursuits is instead consumed by paperwork.
The consequences of this burden are far-reaching, affecting every facet of the healthcare system. Providers are trapped under tight schedules, with their valuable time with patients reduced to hurried note-cramming sessions and personal hours consumed by unfinished documentation. This pressure created by medical documentation is the #1 leading cause of doctor burnout. Meanwhile, patients face barriers to essential healthcare services, with increased wait times that erode satisfaction. Hospital administration grapples with inefficiencies that stifle throughput and strain resources, leading to financial burdens that impact the entire hospital ecosystem.
The cumulative effect of forcing doctors to allocate 50% of the daily time toward documentation is a healthcare system in distress, where the needs of providers, patients, and administrators are in constant conflict.
Opportunity
Sunona is an AI-enhanced tool that autogenerates medical documents within minutes, empowering closer connections between patients and providers.
Upon arriving at the clinic, providers press record on any device with Sunona and turn to face their patients, making eye-contact and engaging in authentic conversation. The consultation is recorded, and in the background, a complete medical document is generated within minutes, reducing a 15-minute note down to a 3-minute breeze. This eliminates the need for extended hours spent on documentation and makes patients feel more heard by their providers.
Powered by AI fine-tuned at MIT, Sunona’s technology is designed to adapt to the individual documentation and stylistic preferences of each provider. Custom templates can be uploaded and autofilled to further tailor the process to the specific needs and subspecialties of clinicians. By automating the documentation process, providers can focus on patient care without the burden of manual note-taking. The system's adaptability and complete HIPAA-compliance ensures alignment with existing practices and standards, offering an effective solution that seamlessly integrates with the current routine of healthcare providers.
Reducing the burden of documentation frees providers to spend time where it matters most – with patients, not paperwork. At Sunona, we enable providers to reclaim time lost to note-writing and instead spend it with people they care for, from their loved ones at home to their patients in the clinic.