Only 10% of the billion-plus ultrasound scans performed each year go toward preventive care, and for minority populations, that number drops below 1%, according to PONS CEO & Co-founder Soner Haci.

At the Civic Health Forum, Haci explained how that data gap actively undermines AI models trained without diverse populations, particularly in women's health, where a review of hospital data across Europe and the US found Asian and Black women each represented in only 1 to 2% of breast cancer screening datasets.

PONS, a Rutgers spinoff, uses the frequency domain of ultrasound to detect small tissue changes without being affected by dense breast tissue, achieving a 64% improvement in a Mayo Clinic study of 800 women. The technology is decentralized enough for midwives to use in the field, where a maternal health project in Africa achieved a 35% improvement in preventing early pregnancy complications. PONS is now working with pharmaceutical companies on real-time clinical trial data and is open to new partnerships with NGOs.