Fighting Sepsis Before It Becomes Critical: An Interview with Dr. Hassan Seddiki, Founder of WAVAmed
Sepsis causes approximately 11 million deaths every year and remains one of the world's leading causes of mortality. Yet most hospital solutions still focus on intensive care units, where patients are already critically ill.
I recently spoke with Dr. Hassan Seddiki, founder and CEO of WAVAmed, a Portuguese health-tech startup developing AI tools to detect patient deterioration and sepsis earlier in hospital wards.
What makes WAVAmed particularly interesting is the founder's personal motivation. Hassan lost his father to sepsis in 2014, an event that led him to become a doctor and dedicate his career to preventing other families from experiencing the same loss.
Some highlights from our conversation:
• WAVAmed continuously monitors more than 70 vital signs and clinical variables to identify early signs of deterioration.
• Instead of comparing patients to population averages, the AI builds an individual baseline for each patient.
• The company focuses on general wards and post-discharge patients, aiming to prevent ICU admissions rather than reacting once patients become critically ill.
• Patient data remains inside hospitals through on-premise deployment, emphasizing data sovereignty and security.
• The company is pursuing EU MDR Class IIa certification, one of the most demanding regulatory frameworks for medical AI.
Dr. Seddiki believes that Europe's strict regulations can become a competitive advantage:
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He also argues that medicine remains too reactive and that AI monitoring will likely become standard practice over the next five years, allowing doctors to focus more on clinical judgment while machines handle continuous monitoring.
Portugal's smaller healthcare ecosystem may also offer startups easier access to decision-makers, helping companies validate solutions more quickly.
What do you think about AI becoming a standard part of hospital monitoring? Can Europe become a leader in trustworthy clinical AI?