Visible Patient Lab
Visible Patient Lab is a French online laboratory turning a patient's CT or MRI scans into interactive 3D organ models for surgical planning. An AI engine produces them; qualified radiographers check each one. Viewing software is free and CE-marked.
What is Visible Patient Lab?
Visible Patient Lab presents itself as the first online laboratory for 3D modelling of medical images. Rather than selling software to install, it runs a service: a surgeon or hospital uploads a patient's routine DICOM study — a CT or an MRI — through a secured web portal, and receives a three-dimensional digital twin of the organ concerned.
The production chain is deliberately hybrid. An artificial-intelligence engine, credited by the company with a major breakthrough announced in 2025, industrialises and automates the segmentation work, non-injected lungs included. Every model is then reviewed by a qualified medical radiographer before delivery, and the publisher presents that human check as part of the product rather than as a safety net.
Coverage spans the liver, lungs, kidneys, colon, pancreas, thyroid and parathyroids, adrenal glands, the cardiovascular system, osteoarticular structures and endometriosis. Named surgical uses include thoracic segmentectomy and lobectomy, hepatic, pancreatic and colonic procedures, partial nephrectomy, paediatric surgery and endocrine surgery.
Two viewing applications complete the offer and are given away free: VP Planning for Windows and macOS, and VP Planning iOS for iPhone and iPad. Both are CE-marked Class IIa medical devices under notified body 0459. They provide interactive 3D viewing, DICOM reading, organ transparency, volume calculation, virtual resection simulation, volume and surface rendering, orthogonal multiplanar reconstruction, image fusion, measurements and reporting. The indications state plainly that the software assists a clinician who remains solely responsible for every final decision, and that it must not be used for primary diagnostic interpretation of mammography.
Beyond the operating theatre, a business line sells bespoke modelling to pharmaceutical laboratories, 3D-printing manufacturers, surgical simulation and robotics companies, preclinical researchers and veterinarians, with exports in STL, VPZ, VTK, MHD and GLB.
Clinical use is authorised only in the countries listed on the certifications page; elsewhere the software is explicitly treated as a prototype restricted to demonstration, research, teaching or patient communication. The company is ISO 13485:2016 certified and MDSAP audited.
What it does
- Build 3D models of a patient's organs from DICOM CT or MRI studies
- Segment anatomical structures — bone, organs, vascular and respiratory trees
- Detect and label organ segments of the liver, lungs and kidneys
- Approximate vascular and respiratory territories from tubular structures
- Calculate organ volumes and simulate virtual resections before surgery
- Display 2D views, volume rendering, surface rendering, orthogonal MPR and image fusion
- Export anatomy for 3D printing, simulation and VR/AR in STL, VPZ, VTK, MHD or GLB
When to use Visible Patient Lab / When not to
A quick filter to help you decide if Visible Patient Lab is the right fit.
When to use Visible Patient Lab
- Thoracic, digestive, urological, paediatric and endocrine surgeons preparing complex resections
- Radiologists and medical radiographers who already work from routine DICOM studies
- Hospitals and surgical departments that want preoperative simulation without installing infrastructure
- Pharmaceutical laboratories and research institutes commissioning bespoke anatomical models
- Manufacturers in 3D printing, surgical simulation and surgical robotics needing STL, VTK or GLB anatomy
When not to use Visible Patient Lab
- Anyone seeking a self-service tool with a published price: every route runs through a sales contact
- Teams needing an API or a software integration, since none is offered or documented
- Clinicians outside the listed certified countries, where the software is only a research or teaching prototype
- Radiologists looking for primary diagnostic reading of mammography, which the indications explicitly exclude
- Patients wanting a direct consumer service, as every request is validated by the company's medical officer
How to use Visible Patient Lab
A typical end-to-end flow, from setup to results.
- Create a user account on the ordering portal, which is required to access the service
- Place the order through the secured portal at vponline-prod.e-mediabox.fr
- Upload the patient's CT or MRI study in routine DICOM format
- Images are de-identified on sending through the E-Media MediaBox secured system
- Visible Patient Lab produces the 3D model, driven by its AI engine
- A qualified medical radiographer systematically reviews the model before it is released
- Download VP Planning for PC or Mac, or VP Planning iOS, free of charge from the download portal
- Open the 3D digital twin in VP Planning to explore anatomy, measure volumes and simulate the resection
- As a patient, complete the request form and send it with a contrast-injected CT or MRI less than three months old
- The patient request is validated by the company's medical officer before any modelling begins
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Documented regulatory status: CE marking, Class IIa, notified body 0459, EC certificate 28229 rev. 9 published as a PDF
- ISO 13485:2016 quality management certification and MDSAP audits
- VP Planning and VP Planning iOS are free, with no installation cost and no maintenance fee
- Every model is systematically reviewed by a qualified medical radiographer
- Health data hosted with a French HDS-accredited provider, and images de-identified on sending
- Full patient reimbursement through insurer and mutual partnerships covering close to 40 million people in France
- Broad anatomical coverage backed by a research ecosystem, scientific publications and named surgeon testimonials
Cons
- No terms and conditions published, so data ownership and reuse are never contractually stated
- No valid public price: the only published grid is a promotional offer whose stated deadline of 31 March 2026 has passed
- Clinical use restricted to a list of countries; elsewhere the software is only a prototype
- No API and no technical documentation, confirmed by negative probes on routes and subdomains
- Laboratory turnaround is inherent: this is not a real-time tool in the surgeon's own hands
- The site says nothing about whether customer imaging data trains its AI models, nor about any opt-out
- No Android application, and some functions such as volume rendering are reserved to PC and Mac
Pricing & Plans
There is no permanent free tier of the modelling service itself: 3D modelling is chargeable, while the VP Planning and VP Planning iOS viewing applications are supplied free of charge, with no installation cost and no maintenance fee. No usable entry price is published. The general rule stated by the publisher is that a specific service contract is defined for each customer whatever their usage frequency, with per-unit purchase possible. Two figures appear on the site: a historical pay per case model at an average of 550 EUR per patient, in force until 2025, and an unlimited subscription priced at a total of 48,000 EUR excluding tax over four years. That second figure is a four-year total, not a unit rate, and the offer is presented as valid until 31 March 2026, a deadline already passed at the time of review. Neither figure can therefore be published as a starting price without misleading. On the patient side, partnerships with insurers and mutual societies provide full reimbursement for close to 40 million people in France.
- VP Planning and VP Planning iOS — viewing and surgical planning software
- free of charge
- Pay per case — per-procedure pricing
- average 550 EUR per patient
- in force until 2025
- Unlimited offer — four-year subscription
- 48
- 000 EUR excluding tax in total
- unlimited volume
- announced as valid until 31 March 2026
- Bespoke service contract — defined according to usage frequency
- per-unit purchase possible
- VP Service BtoB — tailored work for manufacturers
- laboratories and research institutes
- quoted on request
Data, GDPR & hosting
A consolidated view of how Visible Patient Lab handles your data.
GDPR overview
Implementation is explicit and documented. The information notice states that the controller "has undertaken to comply with the General Data Protection Regulation" and with the Swiss Federal Act on Data Protection. An external Data Protection Officer is named: MyData-Trust SA, Boulevard Initialis 7/3, 7000 Mons, Belgium, reachable at Visiblepatient.dpo@mydata-trust.info and +33 9 70 70 20 09. Access, rectification, erasure, objection and portability rights are listed, each request being assessed case by case by that DPO, and a dedicated online form exists for deletion requests. The supervisory authority cited is the French CNIL, alongside the Swiss FDPIC. A section covers transfers outside the EEA, with European Commission standard contractual clauses used where no adequacy decision applies, and all suppliers and subprocessors are declared to be located within the EEA.
Who owns the data?
The site publishes no terms and conditions: a 172-page sitemap yields only legal notices and a patient eligibility form, so contractual ownership of uploaded images and of the delivered 3D models is not stated publicly. The only public document is an information notice, effective 1 February 2022 and last updated 20 October 2023, which names Visible Patient as data controller — the former corporate name, not Visible Patient Lab. The legal notice claims trademarks and image rights for Visible Patient. Medical images are de-identified in transit through the E-Media MediaBox system. Nothing published says what the publisher may do with the imaging data or the resulting models, nor with whom it may share them.
Reuse rights
No public clause grants or restricts reuse by the end user, because no terms and conditions exist on the site. What is documented is the intended use: the 3D model is delivered to the physician for preoperative planning, simulation and intraoperative display, and the indications state that the software assists a clinician who remains solely responsible for all final patient management decisions. For business customers, deliverables are exported in STL, VPZ, VTK, MHD or GLB depending on the application — 3D printing, simulation, virtual and augmented reality, preclinical work or veterinary use — which implies practical reuse in those pipelines without describing any licence.
Data retention & training
Hosting summary
Health data is separated from the marketing site. All data sent to Visible Patient Lab is stated to be stored on a secured server accredited for health data hosting, operated by Docaposte, presented as the leading health data host in France — the HDS accreditation therefore belongs to the host, not to the publisher. Medical images are transmitted and de-identified through the secured MediaBox system of the company E-Media, via the ordering portal. The information notice adds that all suppliers and subprocessors are located within the European Economic Area, cites OVH as an example for email hosting, and provides for European Commission standard contractual clauses where data would be transferred outside the EEA without an adequacy decision. Separately, the showcase website itself is hosted by Devclic, whose server resolves to an address located in Strasbourg, France; that is not the health data platform.
Things to keep in mind
Risks and trade-offs to weigh before adopting Visible Patient Lab.
- The legal notice names Visible Patient Lab, a company registered on 4 March 2025, while the site tells a story starting in 2013 and the original Visible Patient entity is still active in the French register — check which one you are contracting with
- No terms and conditions are published, so ownership and reuse of uploaded medical images and of the delivered 3D models rest on nothing public; the privacy notice still names the former entity as controller and two versions of it coexist on the site
- The site never says whether patient imaging is used to train its AI models, and offers no opt-out — a significant silence for health data
- The HDS health-data hosting accreditation belongs to Docaposte, the host, not to the publisher, yet it appears among the publisher's own quality bullet points; the website host is a different company again
- The 3D model is an approximation — the vascular and respiratory territories are described as such — and over-trusting an automated reconstruction in the operating theatre is a real clinical risk
- The indications reserve the software to qualified professionals, exclude primary diagnostic reading of mammography, and state that the clinician alone carries every final decision
- The headline pricing offer was announced as valid only until 31 March 2026 yet is still displayed, and the MDSAP scope is stated inconsistently across pages
Setup & Integrations
Technical difficulty
Low. The publisher states that a simple internet connection is enough to reach the service, that the planning software is free and runs on PC, Mac, tablets and smartphones, and that it downloads without any specialised deployment. There is no installation cost and no maintenance fee, and the applications run on standard computer hardware. The only prerequisites are a user account on the ordering portal and routine DICOM images; VP Planning iOS requires iOS 15 or later.
Deployment
Apps stores
Supported languages
Behind Visible Patient Lab
Social
Resources
All the official URLs gathered for verification and reference.
Frequently asked questions
What exactly does Visible Patient Lab deliver?
Is this a regulated medical device?
Where does the artificial intelligence come in?
Is the software free?
How much does the modelling cost?
In which countries is clinical use allowed?
Is there an API?
Is there a mobile application?
Where is the health data hosted?
Can a patient obtain a model at no cost?
Should you pick Visible Patient Lab?
Visible Patient Lab occupies a position this directory rarely sees: a laboratory service wrapped around regulated software, rather than a self-service platform. The artificial intelligence is real and load-bearing — the company credits it with industrialising model production and with opening the unlimited offer — but it is an accelerator behind the scenes, not the surface of the product. Every model still passes through a qualified radiographer, and the publisher says so deliberately.
The regulatory groundwork is unusually solid for a tool of this size: CE marking in Class IIa under notified body 0459, a published EC certificate, ISO 13485:2016 certification, MDSAP audits, health data hosted with an HDS-accredited French provider, and de-identification in transit. The free VP Planning applications lower the barrier for a surgeon who simply wants to open a model.
The gaps are just as clear. There are no terms and conditions anywhere on the site, so nothing public says who owns the uploaded images or the delivered models, and nothing addresses whether that imaging data feeds the AI engine. No currently valid price is published: the flagship unlimited offer carries a deadline that has already passed, and everything else runs through a sales conversation. There is no API. Clinical use is confined to a list of certified countries.
One structural point deserves attention. The site tells a story that begins in 2013, but the entity named in its legal notice, Visible Patient Lab, was registered on 4 March 2025, while the original Visible Patient company remains active in the French register. Buyers evaluating continuity, liability or contractual counterparty should establish which entity they are actually contracting with.
- Choosing a selection results in a full page refresh.
- Opens in a new window.