Paperplane Therapeutics has raised $1.5 million to deal with sufferers for ache and anxiousness utilizing digital actuality, probably making journeys to the dentist extra nice.
The Montreal, Canada-based firm focuses on therapeutic digital actuality options for ache and anxiousness administration in healthcare.
Glen Ventures led the spherical, with monetary help from the Gouvernement du Québec via Investissement Québec. Strategic buyers equivalent to CABHI (Centre for Ageing + Mind Well being Innovation), Cedars-Sinai Mental Property Firm, Anges Québec, and Aventure Capital additionally participated.
Ache and anxiousness pose main limitations for sufferers looking for medical care, typically resulting in delays, elevated discomfort, and extra complicated therapies. This concern is especially prevalent in dentistry, the place roughly 36% of people expertise anxiousness throughout dental visits, 12% endure from excessive dental worry, and 22% postpone appointments till ache forces them to hunt care, leading to elevated prices and issues.
With this in thoughts, Paperplane is specializing in the North American dental market, aiming to boost affected person experiences and medical workflows via its therapeutic digital actuality options.
Paperplane’s expertise addresses this problem by reworking dental procedures—typically perceived as painful and traumatic—into extra manageable, even nice experiences via immersive digital actuality.
Designed for sufferers of all ages, with a selected emphasis on pediatric care, Paperplane’s options assist make sufferers extra snug. Paperplane additionally streamlines medical workflows and reduces the burden on clinicians.
“As an emergency doctor, I’ve seen firsthand the shortage of choices out there for managing ache and anxiousness,” stated Jean-Simon Fortin, CEO of Paperplane Therapeutics, in an announcement. “Immediately, I’m proud to see our VR expertise filling that hole, offering healthcare professionals with a more practical strategy to help their sufferers. This funding will enable us to increase our attain, enabling much more clinicians to ship actually transformative care.”
This funding marks a major milestone in Paperplane’s progress, and it’ll allow the corporate to proceed its mission of deploying digital actuality therapies within the dental sector, bettering each affected person outcomes and care supply throughout North America. Moreover, this funding will help Paperplane’s growth into Europe via a strategic partnership with French firm HypnoVR, backed by its CE Mark certification.
Michael Goodman, founding companion at Glen Ventures, stated in an announcement, “Paperplane is redefining how we method ache and anxiousness administration in healthcare. Their VR options not solely improve affected person consolation but in addition contribute to extra environment friendly medical workflows. We’re proud to help an organization that’s elevating the usual of affected person care whereas pushing the boundaries of medical innovation.”
Christopher Skeete, Quebec’s Minister for the Economic system and Minister Accountable for the Combat Towards Racism, stated in an announcement, “Quebec’s ingenuity has the facility to form the way forward for our healthcare system, and Paperplane Therapeutics is a primary instance. Our authorities is proud to help the event of options that enhance each the standard and accessibility of affected person care.”
“Paperplane Therapeutics helps place Quebec as a frontrunner in medical expertise innovation via its digital actuality options,” added Bicha Ngo, CEO of Investissement Québec, in an announcement. “By rethinking the affected person expertise, the corporate demonstrates the immense potential of Quebec’s healthcare innovation ecosystem. With this funding, they now have the sources to speed up their progress.”
So far, the corporate has raised $1 million in seed spherical dilutive funding and $1 million in non-dilutive funding. The agency has seven folks. The agency was based in 2019 however the cofounders began working collectively on R&D and medical trials in 2014.
Relating to the inspiration, Fortin carried out a analysis venture on utilizing VR to handle ache and anxiousness. Impressed by the outcomes, he teamed up with David Paquin, an knowledgeable in creation and new media, and along with college college students, they developed their first VR answer for youngsters needing painful dressing adjustments at Sainte-Justine Kids’s Hospital. Inspired by the success of those early trials, they established Paperplane Therapeutics in 2019 to commercialize and increase these transformative VR therapies
