SmartHeal

Who are you and what is SmartHeal?

I’m Dr Santosh Kaur, the founder and CEO of SmartHeal. I’m a clinician and healthcare innovator with more than 15 years of experience across hospitals, operating theatres and aged care.

SmartHeal is an AI-powered wound care platform that helps clinicians capture, assess, treat and monitor wounds more consistently. A smartphone image can support wound measurement, tissue analysis, treatment guidance and progress tracking.

What problem had you seen in wound care?

Wound care still relies heavily on manual measurement, subjective assessment and fragmented documentation. That creates inconsistency between clinicians and makes it harder to identify whether a wound is improving or deteriorating.

The problem becomes even more serious for people in community care, aged care or remote locations where specialist support may be limited. I wanted to give frontline clinicians an accessible tool that could improve the quality and consistency of the decisions they make.

How did you move from clinician to founder?

My background was in healthcare and I was learning how to build a technology company around clinical work. I needed a practical way to scope the MVP, establish the right technical foundations and navigate a highly regulated market.

We broke the product into a clear four-stage workflow: capture, analyse, suggest and monitor. That structure saved time and helped us focus development on the clinical tasks where technology could have the greatest impact.

Where is SmartHeal today?

SmartHeal has developed a mobile platform and clinical dashboard for wound assessment, patient management and reporting. The company is working with healthcare, research and innovation partners including RMIT University, the University of Melbourne and ANDHealth.

It has received recognition through the Anyone Can pitch competition, the Australian Technologies Competition and the Women in AI APAC Awards. I was also named Australian Sikh Woman of the Year in 2024 and SmartHeal has been featured by SBS.

We are continuing to build the clinical evidence, partnerships and regulatory pathway needed to bring more consistent wound care to patients at scale.