Mayo Clinic is teaming up with a Los Angeles-based startup that bills itself as the "Netflix for medical education" in order to increase access to medical knowledge around the world.
GIBLIB is a streaming platform that claims to offer the largest library of on-demand medical lectures and surgical videos in 4K and virtual reality. GIBLIB will now bring Mayo Clinic's medical conference lectures online and share them with users.
Knowledge sharing within the medical community often takes place at medical and scientific conferences. Of course, not everyone is able to make it to these events in person. GIBLIB hopes to counter the challenge of limited accessibility with its platform, which the company says offers an alternative and more effective way to engage with a new generation of tech-savvy medical professionals.
Virtual reality has become an increasingly popular method for medical education in recent years. Chicago-based Level Ex has raised more than $13 million over the past several years for creating "video games for doctors" to help them with things like learning new techniques and practicing with new medical devices.
GIBLIB has already made Mayo's existing video library of medical conference lectures available to its subscribers. Just like Netflix, GIBLIB users can select from a variety of subscriptions, which range from $49 per month to $600 per year. The pricier memberships come with either an Apple Watch or Oculus Go.
Mayo and GIBLIB plan to collaborate on a new series of 4K and virtual reality videos which will feature the hospital's teaching faculty. The companies will also remaster existing content to make it "more cinematic and engaging" for an online audience. This effort would include condensed short-form video segments of the most popular medical conference topics.
"The medical world continues to advance its adoption of new technologies, yet the way medical professionals learn and engage with educational and instructional content remains stagnant," GIBLIB CEO Brian Conyer said in a statement. "By working with Mayo Clinic, we are helping medical professionals worldwide learn from some of the most forward-thinking, sought-after surgeons and physicians at the top-ranked hospital in the world."
GIBLIB has similar partnerships with other experts in the medical field, including Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Stanford Children's Hospital and the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California.
In addition to the content relationship, GIBLIB has also granted Mayo Clinic a seat on its board of directors.
