Sabal Medical

Sabal Medical, established in 2006, focused on enhancing medication administration safety and efficiency within hospitals and long-term care facilities. The firm developed technology centered around mobile medication tracking using barcode verification to ensure patients receive the correct medication and dosage at the appropriate time. Its target clients were healthcare organizations aiming to reduce the estimated $2 billion annual cost to U.S. hospitals from preventable adverse drug events.

The company was initially founded in Seattle, Washington, before being recruited to Charleston, South Carolina, in late 2006 through an investment from SC Launch!, a state-funded seed capital source. This initial funding enabled Sabal Medical to produce and demonstrate a prototype of its flagship product, MedCenter™, a mobile medication cart. The MedCenter™ cart was designed to provide nurses with secure, audited, bedside access to patient medications by combining electro-mechanical controls with software in a compact footprint suitable for patient rooms. The company also offered a software product for facilities that already possessed a medication dispensing system.

Sabal Medical secured its first institutional financing round in early 2008, led by Nexus Medical Partners and its German affiliate, Medicis Ventures Management GmbH. This capital was instrumental in moving towards commercial production. Following the achievement of key customer milestones, the company closed a second tranche of financing to scale up production and support operations to meet growing sales demand. Over its history, Sabal Medical raised a total of $5.41M from investors including Medicis Capital, NMT Capital, South Carolina Research Authority, and Upstate Carolina Angel Network. The company was eventually acquired by Swisslog Holding.

Keywords: medication administration, patient safety, barcode verification, mobile medication cart, hospital technology, long-term care facilities, healthcare efficiency, adverse drug event prevention, MedCenter, Swisslog Holding acquisition, medication tracking, pharmacy technology, nursing technology, bedside automation, SC Launch