Mural Health raises $8M to shake up clinical trial participants' experience

At the fusion of fintech and medical research, Mural is modernizing the patient-trial connect

Consistent participation of patients in clinical trials is integral for the efficacy of medical treatment research. Yet there is a 30% dropout rate of participants due to medical reasons, burden of time and travel, challenging protocol, and lack of support. To solve some of these issues, Mural Health is building an app connecting participants and their caregivers with trial sites.

This week, Mural Health Technologies, Inc. announced it raised $8 million in seed funding as it modernizes the clinical trial participant experience.

Bessemer Venture Partners led the round; operating for more than a century, the San Francisco-based VC firm is one of the oldest in the United States. Other participants were Virtue VC in Austin, which backs early-stage healthcare startups, NYC-based Operator Partners, Project Mayhem Ventures, and Arkitect Ventures, and Correlation Ventures in San Diego (an investor in Imperfect Foods, see story).

Mural Health runs a mobile app, called Mural Link, where patients and clinicians stay connected and participants can share their experience. This allows for quick communication, plus the company can analyze participant satisfaction, potential withdrawals, and retention. Payments for stipends or travel can also be managed through the system, and participants have flexible, fast options like Zelle on how they receive money. For trial participants, Mural Link is free.

The Berwyn, PA-based company was founded in 2022 by Samuel Whitaker, Jason Dong, and Shawn Milochik. Earlier, Mural co-CEO Whitaker founded Greenphire, which developed trial payments system ClinCard. Now, as Mural said a release, its app disrupts Whitaker’s prior project with its expanded functionality.

"Participants in clinical trials often get overlooked as the industry, and the world, focus on study results. But patients and their caregivers represent ground-zero. They are the source of data and without their participation new therapies cannot be safely brought to market," said Whitaker in a statement.

He added, “We believe that as we serve participants well, study sponsors will enjoy improved enrollment, retention, and protocol compliance. And the global community will, consequently, be better served by the new products that are made possible by clinical R&D.”

Among its customers today, Mural Health counts three of the world’s top 15 pharma giants. It’s also partnered with biotechs including Sonex Health and platforms such as clinical data tech Clinical ink and Ledger Run, a trial management software.

Cindy Grabowski, VP of Clinical Affairs at Sonex, said that out of several participant support systems she has tried, Mural Link was exactly what was needed. “Their product is intuitive, delightful to interact with, and is clearly designed for the patient and caretaker," she said in a statement.

Separately, Mural Health runs "The Portrait Project,” where it gets up close and personal with people at the backstage of medical research – patients, caregivers, researchers – and tells their stories. And these true stories are indeed heartbreaking – full of hope, full of hurt, strength, progressing disabilities, grief, recovery, and survival.

Images taken in part from: Mural Health, The Portrait Project, Rawpixel