VITALL to Commercialize UHN’s Medly Heart Failure Care Technology

Toronto, Canada, August 19, 2025 – VITALL Intelligence Inc. (VITALL), an advanced digital health service, has entered into an agreement with University Health Network (UHN) intended to grant VITALL an exclusive license to commercialize UHN’s Medly heart failure (HF) platform, to support HF patients worldwide.

Medly – a Class II Medical Device – is a digital therapeutic platform for the remote care, management, and engagement of patients at home through easy-to-use ubiquitous technologies – such as a smartphone. Research studies demonstrate its ability to reduce heart failure hospitalizations by 50%, (Ware et al, 2020) [i] and to facilitate the dosing of complex medication regimes both safely and in a more timely way (Brahmbhatt et al, 2024).[iv]

Heart failure is the most rapidly rising cardiovascular disease in Canada, with more than 50,000 new diagnoses each year. It affects over one million Canadians, and is the single most common reason for hospital admission and readmission in Canada – leading to rising health care costs.[ii] Projected costs of heart failure-related hospitalizations in Canada are estimated to increase to $19.5 billion by 2040, showing a clear need to improve the use of acute care services for HF patients (Ellis et al, 2025). [iii]

“It is a privilege to be the commercialization partner for such a transformative technology developed right here in Ontario,” says Don Simmonds, VITALL’s founder and Chief Executive Officer. “We look forward to working closely with the visionaries at UHN including Dr. Joseph Cafazzo and Dr. Heather Ross, to deliver a digital therapeutic that improves the lives of patients while driving down the high costs of heart failure care.”

First introduced into clinical care at UHN in 2018, Medly’s model of care is based on an expert system developed at UHN’s Centre for Digital Therapeutics to assist patients and clinicians with the management of HF. It has supported more than 2,500 heart failure patients at UHN to date. Medly’s clinical results have been widely recognized through over 30 published articles, and include:

• A 50% reduction in heart failure hospitalizations[i]
• 35% fewer in-person appointments[iv]
• 40% quicker optimization of medications[iv]
• Enhanced patient outcomes through timely adjustments of medications at home[iv]

Medly has been utilized in 5 Toronto-based hospital sites in partnership with two Northern Ontario Indigenous Health Authorities (Weeneebayko Area Health Authority [WAHA] and Sioux Lookout First Nations Health Authority, [SLFNHA]). Its uniqueness and value earned Medly a Breakthrough Device designation by the USA Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on the basis of ensuring its availability to HF patients as a novel and effective care option.

Scaling Medly provides a unique, immediate opportunity to transform heart failure care for patients while introducing significant savings within the health care system. Currently, just over 12% of heart failure patients in Canada receive care by hospitals with HF expertise and resources.[v] Medly’s technology enables an optimized model of care, enabling specially trained nurses, with physician oversight, to lead care coordination for heart failure patients with the aim of providing high-quality care while improving system capacity.

VITALL delivers its services through an innovative health data utility platform that brings together a patient’s previously fragmented health information, making it accessible whenever and wherever it's needed. Designed to support care outside the hospital, the platform empowers clinicians with better day-to-day insights into their patients’ health, while helping individuals take a more active role in managing their own care. Plans are underway to integrate Medly’s heart-failure technology into the VITALL platform to enable broader, scalable service delivery—starting in North America, with future expansion planned globally.

About VITALL

VITALL makes patient health information meaningful by delivering it where and when it is needed most. Its comprehensive health information platform gives patients and their circle of care access to unified health information and visualizations in a secure, user-friendly application. The VITALL service consolidates a patient’s clinical data, wearable data and at-home tests taken with their smartphone to provide real-time health journey insights without having to travel to a clinic or hospital. VITALL’s FHIR[vi] platform is SOC II certified and includes a strong patient consent framework, meeting privacy and regulatory compliance.

About Medly

Developed at UHN’s Peter Munk Cardiac Centre in partnership with The Ted Rogers Centre for Heart Research, the Medly Platform (Medly) is an innovative digital therapeutic for patients living with complex chronic conditions such as heart failure (HF). Medly is based on discoveries made by UHN’s Drs. Heather Ross, Division Head of Cardiology at its Peter Munk Cardiac Centre, site lead at the Ted Rogers Centre for Heart Research, Loretta Rogers Chair in Heart Function and Pfizer Chair in Cardiovascular Research, and Joseph Cafazzo, Executive Director, Biomedical Engineering, UHN’s Centre for Digital Therapeutics and Wolfond Chair in Digital Health.

Medly’s technology uses an algorithm within an app installed on the patient’s mobile device to assess daily health metrics and recommends various actions the patient can take at home. Changes in the patient’s condition are reported to nurse-led teams and practitioners immediately through a digital dashboard for follow up. Developed with philanthropic support through UHN Foundation, Medly was first introduced into clinical care at UHN in 2018 and is now a Health Canada approved, Class II Medical Device.

For more information and media inquiries, please contact:
April Hackner, VITALL Communications

ahackner@vitall.com

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[i]Ware, P., et al., Outcomes of a heart failure telemonitoring program implemented as the standard of care in an outpatient heart function clinic: Pretest-posttest pragmatic study. Journal of Medical Internet Research. 2020;22(2).e16538.

^[ii] 1 - Heart & Stroke Foundation, The Burden of Heart Failure. 2017; 2 - Blais, C., et al., Assessing the burden of hospitalized and community-care heart failure in Canada. Canadian Journal of Cardiology, 2014. 30(3): p. 352-358.

^[iii] Ellis, E. E., et al. (2025). Economic burden of heart failure hospitalizations in Canada: A population-based study. CJC Open, 7(3), 279–286.

[iv] Brahmbhatt, D. H., et al. (2024) The effect of using a remote patient management platform in optimizing guideline-directed medical therapy in heart failure patients: A randomized controlled trial. JACC: Heart Failure, 12(4).

[v]Moghaddam, N., et al. (2023). Access to heart failure services in Canada: Findings of the Heart and Stroke National Heart Failure Resources and Services Inventory. Canadian Journal of Cardiology, 39(10), 1415–1423.

^[vi] Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) is a global standard for exchanging healthcare information electronically, enabling rapid and secure data sharing among different systems and organizations.

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