How Kivira is Improving Mental Health Diagnosis

More than half of mental health diagnoses are incorrect – an unfortunate reality documented by institutions such as the National Institute of Mental Health and supported by research.

These errors often originate in primary care settings, not due to negligence, but because most primary care clinicians receive limited psychiatric training while facing significant time and system constraints.

The consequences are far-reaching: delayed or ineffective treatment, worsening patient outcomes, clinician burnout, and tens of billions of dollars wasted each year on trial-and-error.

For Maria T. Carmona, MBA ’25, those consequences weren’t just theoretical — they were personal.

For more than a decade, a close family member lived with an incorrect mental health diagnosis. Despite regular interaction with the healthcare system, the underlying issue went unrecognized, leading to years of ineffective treatment and challenges. When the correct diagnosis was finally made, the impact was immediate and transformative.

“I saw how much their life changed once it was correct,” Carmona said. “It completely changed how I thought about mental health care.”

The experience left her with a question: why, in a healthcare system driven by data, were mental health diagnoses still so inconsistent, and often, incorrect?

That question became the starting point for Kivira, a clinician-first company focused on bringing greater accuracy to mental health diagnosis.

Shaped at Booth

Before Kivira, Carmona was already a seasoned entrepreneur. She founded her first company at 19 in Venezuela and went on to build and scale multiple technology startups, including ventures backed by Y Combinator. Yet despite her experience, she avoided healthcare.

“The more you understand healthcare, the more intimidating it becomes,” Carmona said. “It’s complex, regulated, and often slow-moving.”

Carmona entered the University of Chicago Booth School of Business knowing she wanted to tackle this challenge — even if the solution was still taking shape. Her Booth application essay focused on the mental health misdiagnosis crisis.

Once on campus, Booth and the Polsky Center became central to Kivira’s formation. Carmona began interviewing clinicians — including more than 300 primary care providers — using her Booth affiliation to open doors across the University of Chicago ecosystem. She connected with UChicago Medicine physicians, faculty advisors, and legal experts, asking fundamental questions about trust, workflow, and clinical adoption.

“That access mattered,” Carmona said. “People were willing to engage because I was a Booth student trying to solve a real problem.”

Through those conversations, Kivira evolved from an early consumer-facing concept into a clinician-first B2B company focused on diagnosis. Carmona also assembled Kivira’s founding team through these networks, including senior psychiatric leaders and technical experts with deep healthcare research backgrounds.

A clinician-first approach

Rather than asking clinicians to change their behavior or adopt new tools, Kivira integrates directly into existing healthcare systems. When a mental health concern is identified during a primary care visit, Kivira’s platform automatically triggers a structured assessment.

Using rigorously validated methodologies and machine learning models trained on clinical data, Kivira generates a diagnostic report — delivered entirely within the clinician’s existing workflow. The goal is precision without disruption.

“We didn’t want to create an AI system that just confuses users,” Carmona said. “This is grounded in decades of psychiatric research. We’re connecting proven science and delivering it in a way clinicians can trust.”

The result benefits everyone in the system – patients receive more accurate diagnoses sooner, clinicians gain clarity and confidence, and payers reduce costly trial-and-error treatment.

Turning conviction into a company

By the time Carmona applied to the Polsky Center’s Global New Venture Challenge, Kivira already existed in concept. There was early code, an emerging thesis, and a deep sense of conviction around the problem she wanted to solve. What GNVC provided was the structure to turn that conviction into a company the market could understand.

“Things were moving so fast,” Carmona said. “Having the structure that GNVC gives you—through the classes, the deadlines, the feedback—was incredibly grounding. It helped connect what we were doing in the real world to what we were being taught in the classroom.”

Through GNVC, Carmona and her team were forced to continuously pressure-test their assumptions with faculty and coaches who advise and build leading companies. Those conversations played a critical role in sharpening Kivira’s focus.

“GNVC was where Kivira was really born,” Carmona said. “It existed in my mind before, but translating it to the real market — that’s where GNVC was instrumental.”

Kivira ultimately won first place at the 18th Annual GNVC, receiving the top prize and $50,000.

And while Carmona is clear that she would have pursued Kivira regardless, she credits GNVC with providing a framework that kept the company from becoming trapped in theory.

“GNVC gave us discipline,” she said. “It helped take something that lived in my head and turn it into a company that could exist in the world.”

Real-world deployment

Since emerging from the Booth and Polsky ecosystem, Kivira has hit several major milestones. The company recently completed development of its medication recommendation model using its in-house technical team, a significant step toward broader clinical deployment. The company is also exploring ways to further expand the number of patients and care providers interacting with its systems.

Most recently, Kivira closed a $1.8 million pre-seed round led by Wellstar Health System, an integrated health system operating 11 hospitals and more than 450 outpatient sites. And for Kivira, Wellstar proved to be the perfect partner.

“For us, this wasn’t just about capital,” Carmona said. “It was about partnering with people that see the problem and want to deploy a solution at scale.”

Looking ahead

Kivira’s long-term vision extends beyond primary care. Carmona sees the company building diagnostic infrastructure for mental health across every point of care — from hospitals and private practices to universities, employee assistance programs, veteran services, and government systems.

“The infrastructure already exists,” she said. “Primary care is everywhere. What’s missing are the tools to make diagnosis more accurate.”

As Kivira continues to grow, for Carmona, the work remains grounded in the experience that started it all — seeing firsthand what happens when mental health diagnosis gets it wrong, and how much changes when it gets it right.

“Seeing the impact that the right diagnosis has on someone is extraordinary,” she said. “That’s what keeps us going. If we can help people get to the right help sooner, the ripple effects — for patients, families, and the entire system — are enormous.”