Voice recognition technology has become a common part of our daily lives, but there is still a significant gap when it comes to speakers of minority languages or those with thick accents or speech disorders. Intron Health, a clinical speech recognition startup founded by Tobi Olatunji, is working to address this issue.
Intron Health boasts the largest clinical database in Africa, with its algorithm trained on 3.5 million audio clips from over 18,000 contributors spanning 29 countries and 288 accents. The startup primarily focuses on healthcare practitioners to ensure that medical terms are accurately captured for their target markets.
Olatunji’s background as a medical doctor in Nigeria fueled his desire to improve healthcare systems by reducing inefficiencies and automating repetitive tasks. After pursuing advanced degrees in medical informatics and computer science in the U.S., he gained experience at tech companies where he focused on natural language processing for healthcare.
Initially, Intron Health aimed to digitize hospital operations in Africa through an Electronic Medical Record (EMR) System, but physicians preferred writing over typing. This led Olatunji to develop a speech recognition technology that can recognize African accents and be integrated into existing EMRs, leading to improved efficiency in hospitals.
The startup has already made significant strides, reducing the waiting time for radiology results in one hospital from 48 hours to just 20 minutes. By streamlining administrative tasks and reducing errors, Intron Health’s technology is helping to enhance patient care and improve workflow for healthcare providers.
Looking ahead, Intron Health is focused on perfecting noise cancellation, ensuring functionality in low-bandwidth settings, and expanding capabilities such as multi-speaker conversation transcription and text-to-speech features. The startup also aims to incorporate decision support tools to assist with tasks like prescriptions and lab tests, further enhancing the quality of care provided.
Intron Health recently secured a $1.6 million pre-seed funding round, allowing the company to explore new growth opportunities and continue developing its innovative technology. With the global speech and voice recognition market projected to grow significantly in the coming years, Intron Health is well-positioned to make a lasting impact in the medical field.
Moreover, the startup is actively involved in speech research in Africa, collaborating with industry leaders like Google Research and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to evaluate Large Language Models (LLMs) and ensure culturally attuned models are available for African clinics and hospitals. By addressing biases and risks in LLMs, Intron Health is contributing to the advancement of speech technology in the region.
