Osmosis is bringing personalized learning to medical school, and beyond

Baltimore is well-known for its strengths in healthcare and education technology. In one growing startup that was founded in the city and continues to be based here, both of those areas are represented.
Osmosis applies learning platform tools to education for medical and health professionals.
“Our mission is to provide clinicians the best education so they can provide you the best care,” said Shiv Gaglani, the company’s CEO.
Gaglani and cofounder Ryan Haynes began developing the idea while they were medical students at Johns Hopkins. They found they were both interested in how they were studying, as well as the subject matter. Starting with early work on a tool to help their own classmates, Osmosis developed a personalized learning platform that helps students study for classes and boards. The tools offered allow students can organize their study plans and materials, and there is additional content such as concept cards, flashcards and videos. In addition to providing the content, the system can automatically recommend other course material based on what someone is studying.
For Osmosis, medical education extends beyond school, as well. The startup creates medical education videos that are distributed widely through Wikipedia and YouTube. The video team includes former members of the Khan Academy Medicine team. They seek to bring an in-depth approach to explaining topics clearly in an animated format. Videos created can also help professionals who need a review, and also educate patients and their families, Gaglani said.

Happy #StudyTipThursday! Learn about memory palaces with our video ( https://t.co/gjeDj1J7vU) and work on it at https://t.co/5DlYbC7g4r! pic.twitter.com/giUQumKZFh

— Osmosis from Elsevier (@OsmosisMed) August 17, 2017

As it grew and developed, Osmosis participated in the Dreamit Health accelerator in Philly, and won the Milken-Penn Graduate School of Education Business Plan Competition in 2014, our sister site Technical.ly Philly reported. The startup also got support from investors including Medscape founder Peter Frishauf and American Board of Medical Specialties CEO Lois Nora.
Gaglani said Osmosis now reaches 300,000 people, and is looking to continue to grow. The company’s distributed team has grown to 25, and is looking to grow its Maryland team. Osmosis recently received a $100,000 from TEDCO’s Seed Investment Fund to help in that effort.