UK based Patients Know Best (PKB), the world’s only fully patient-controlled online medical records system raised $1.7m of investment led by global venture capital fund Maxfield Capital.

Patients Know Best is an online tool enabling patients to better organise, manage and control access to their own healthcare records – it also saves the time of physicians and doctors by enabling secure online consultations, remote monitoring and shared care planning.

Patients Know Best is already working in over 40 medical institutions across the world and its customers include Great Ormond Street Hospital, St Marks Hospital, Luton & Dunstable Hospital and Leicester Medical School.

Dr Mohammad Al-Ubaydli, founder and CEO of Patients Know Best said:

"We believe that putting patients in control of access to their medical records is crucial to improving patient care and driving efficiency in the NHS and beyond. Today, PKB is connecting patients’ data across hospitals, community nursing teams, social care, mental health trusts and prisons. The technology is used across eight countries in eleven different languages. This investment will enable us to develop the product further and hire additional clinical staff to support the company’s continued rapid growth."

Patients with long-term conditions are often treated by multiple care teams who only have a partial view of that patient’s medical history – which can affect the care they receive. By using Patients Know Best, the patient can give anyone involved in their care a single view of their medical records – and receive more rounded, joined-up care.

Alexander Lazarev of Maxfield Capital said:

"We believe the Patients Know Best approach of putting the patient at the heart of their healthcare management is unique. It solves the problem of a fragmented Electronic Healthcare Record market, which sees many different healthcare providers developing siloed information systems and thus prevents patient information flowing freely between organisations. PKB can be easily connected to a customer’s existing Electronic Health Record systems without any additional development from them".