Draft:Doccla

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Doccla
Company typePrivate
IndustryHealth technology
Founded2019
FoundersMartin Ratz, Dag Larsson
Headquarters
Area served
United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Germany, Italy
ServicesVirtual Wards, Remote Patient Monitoring, Proactive Care, Clinical Trials

Doccla is a British health technology company that provides virtual ward, remote patient monitoring, and proactive care services. Its model is described as covering the continuum of care from early proactive monitoring at population scale to time-limited virtual wards for acute recovery. The company was founded in 2019 by Martin Ratz and Dag Larsson.[1]

The company is regulated by the Care Quality Commission in England.[2] By 2025, Doccla was active across more than 60% of NHS integrated care boards in England, held national contracts with NHS Wales and Ireland’s Health Service Executive, and operated services in France, Germany and Italy.[3]

History

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Doccla was established in 2019 after co-founder Martin Ratz experienced a heart attack and identified gaps in follow-up care after hospital discharge.[4] Early contracts were secured with NHS trusts in England to support remote patient monitoring.

In September 2022, Doccla raised £15 million in a Series A funding round led by General Catalyst, with participation from Speedinvest, Giant Ventures and KHP Ventures.[5][6] The investment was reported to support expansion of clinical capacity, integration with electronic health record systems, and further growth in UK health systems.

In September 2024, Doccla raised £35 million in a Series B funding round led by Lakestar, with participation from General Catalyst, Elaia, Speedinvest, and Bertelsmann Investments.[7][8] The funding was reported to support expansion across Europe, including new operations in France, Germany and Italy.[9]

Products and services

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Doccla provides end-to-end virtual care solutions that combine software, devices, logistics, onboarding, remote monitoring, clinical services, and integration with existing health systems.

  • Platform and software: Doccla offers clinician dashboards, patient and carer apps, and reporting tools. These allow continuous/passive or intermittent monitoring, with personalised alerts, early warning scores and analytics.[10]
  • Medical devices: The company supplies integrated clinical-grade wearable and Bluetooth-enabled devices such as pulse oximeters and blood pressure monitors. Tablets and smartphones are pre-configured with SIMs and remote device-management software.[11]
  • Logistics: Devices are delivered directly to patients or hospitals, with processes for calibration, decontamination, and return. In 2025, Doccla partnered with courier company Gophr to support same-day delivery of monitoring equipment.[12]
  • Patient support and onboarding: Patients are onboarded remotely and given live support, with follow-up if readings are missed.
  • Clinical monitoring: Doccla’s Care Quality Commission-registered clinical team includes nurses, general practitioners and consultants who provide continuous monitoring of patient data. The team triages patients, develops treatment plans, and can prescribe where appropriate, in addition to escalating to NHS services if deterioration is detected.[13]
  • Integration: Doccla integrates with NHS systems including NHS Spine, EMIS, SystmOne, EPIC and Cerner to ensure data flows into existing clinical workflows.[14]
  • Proactive care: Longer-term, lower-intensity monitoring designed to identify patients at rising risk of deterioration before crisis. Programmes use population health stratification tools to target those with greatest need, enabling services to scale to patient cohorts in the tens of thousands.[15]
  • Life sciences and clinical trials: Doccla’s platform has also been used to support decentralised clinical trials and life sciences research, enabling remote data collection from participants using medical devices integrated with the monitoring system.[16]

Proactive care monitoring

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Alongside virtual wards, Doccla promotes proactive care monitoring as a longer-term, lower-intensity model designed for people living with chronic conditions. Unlike virtual wards, which are time-limited and often follow an acute hospital admission, proactive programmes aim to identify patients at “rising risk” of deterioration before they reach a crisis point. This focus reflects wider evidence that a small proportion of patients account for a large share of NHS activity and cost: research by The Health Foundation found that in 2014–15 the top 5% of users of primary and secondary care services contributed a disproportionately large fraction of total system costs.[17]

Doccla’s proactive care model therefore aims to intervene earlier with measures such as continuous or intermittent remote monitoring, medicines optimisation, nurse-led education, multidisciplinary team reviews, and health coaching.[15] According to Doccla’s published white paper, proactive monitoring can reduce non-elective hospital admissions by up to 29% and emergency department attendances by 20–30%, while more than 95% of patients report satisfaction with the service.[15] Programmes are often structured around a tiered model, with higher-intensity monitoring for those at greatest risk and lower-intensity, maintenance support for patients who are stable. This model allows the company to scale services to patient cohorts in the tens of thousands rather than the hundreds typically supported through time-limited virtual wards.[15]

The approach has been presented as consistent with national health policy, including the NHS 10-Year Health Plan, which emphasises moving care “left” from hospitals into the community, scaling digital services, and prioritising prevention.[18] Proactive monitoring also makes use of population health tools to stratify patients and target those with the greatest clinical and social need, aiming to reduce inequalities in access to care.[15]

Technology and integration

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Doccla’s platform is device-agnostic and interoperable with existing NHS infrastructure, including Spine, EMIS and Cerner. Remote observations can therefore be viewed by clinicians within their existing electronic records systems.[19]

System impact

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Doccla's model has been deployed at scale to support health systems under capacity pressure. In 2025, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde announced the introduction of 1,000 "virtual ward" beds using the platform, with the aim of shifting inpatient care into the community and improving hospital bed availability.[20]

Clinical evaluations and outcomes

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Independent studies and NHS pilot programmes have reported measurable outcomes from Doccla's use in virtual wards and remote patient monitoring.

A study published in Gut evaluated patients with decompensated cirrhosis discharged from hospital and monitored at home using Doccla's platform for six weeks. The monitored group experienced fewer emergency admissions (12% compared with 28% in controls) and lower 90-day liver-related mortality.[21]

In a heart failure pilot with East and North Hertfordshire NHS Trust, patients supported through home monitoring saw a reduction in 30-day readmissions by around half, alongside a reduction in emergency attendances. The programme was reported by Doccla to have saved more than £500,000 over six months if scaled across the local health system.[22][23]

Patient experience and governance

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Patient surveys have reported high levels of satisfaction, with more than 95% of respondents rating their care as "good" or "very good".[24] Health technology reporting has also noted high compliance rates in virtual ward programmes using the platform.[25]

Clinical monitoring is delivered by a Care Quality Commission-registered team including nurses, general practitioners and consultants.[26]

References

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  1. ^ "Doccla raises a £35m Series B to scale its virtual ward in France and DACH".
  2. ^ "Doccla bags £35M for European expansion". 3 September 2024.
  3. ^ "Doccla bags £35M for European expansion". 3 September 2024. Retrieved 17 September 2025.
  4. ^ "About Doccla | Redefining Healthcare with Virtual Care".
  5. ^ "'Virtual ward' startup Doccla gets Series a injection as it eyes AI tools". 29 September 2022.
  6. ^ "Doccla Raises £15M in Series a Funding". 29 September 2022.
  7. ^ "Doccla raises a £35m Series B to scale its virtual ward in France and DACH".
  8. ^ "Doccla bags £35M for European expansion". 3 September 2024.
  9. ^ "Doccla bags £35M for European expansion". 3 September 2024. Retrieved 17 September 2025.
  10. ^ "Doccla and Happitech partner to offer remote AF monitoring". 29 August 2025.
  11. ^ "Doccla teams with Gophr for same-day delivery of medical devices". 13 June 2025.
  12. ^ "Doccla teams with Gophr for same-day delivery of medical devices". 13 June 2025.
  13. ^ "Doccla bags £35M for European expansion". 3 September 2024.
  14. ^ "How can virtual care enable providers to shift from reactive to proactive and deliver better patient outcomes?".
  15. ^ a b c d e "The Case for Proactive Monitoring". Doccla. 2024. Retrieved 17 September 2025.
  16. ^ "Doccla raises a £35m Series B to scale its virtual ward in France and DACH". Retrieved 17 September 2025.
  17. ^ "Health-care use by high-cost, high-need patients". The Health Foundation. 2019. Retrieved 17 September 2025.
  18. ^ "Fit for the future: a 10-year plan for England's health". Gov.uk. 2024. Retrieved 17 September 2025.
  19. ^ "How can virtual care enable providers to shift from reactive to proactive and deliver better patient outcomes?".
  20. ^ https://med-tech-insights.com/2025/05/09/virtual-hospital-beds-in-scotland-beginning-of-tech-revolution/
  21. ^ Ballesteros, Katie; Kumaravel Kanagavelu, Aravind Sunderavel; Crone, Jennifer; Rahman, Rishan; Schlitzer, Arturo; Sharma, Vikram (2024). P126 Improving patient outcomes in decompensated liver disease through remote monitoring: A real-world experience. Vol. 73. pp. A90.1–A90. doi:10.1136/gutjnl-2024-BASL.129.
  22. ^ "Case Study | Managing Heart Failure at Home - Pilot Case Study".
  23. ^ "How can virtual care enable providers to shift from reactive to proactive and deliver better patient outcomes?".
  24. ^ "Download: The Case for Proactive Monitoring".
  25. ^ "Doccla raises a £35m Series B to scale its virtual ward in France and DACH".
  26. ^ "Doccla bags £35M for European expansion". 3 September 2024.
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