Towards the end of last month we were delighted to receive a visit from Tony Lloyd MP who came to our offices to find out more about our work. Local press reported his visit and the comment he made about NTAC.
“We are hearing a great deal about innovation and how it represents the future for an improved NHS. However, innovation as a concept can feel a little intangible. What exactly does it mean and represent. By visiting NTAC I now have a far better understanding of what can be achieved and how innovation can benefit individual patients and the NHS as a whole.”
As previously blogged the team has been very busy finishing the iTAPP adoption and briefing packs all of which will be with the Department of Health soon.
The draft Intra-operative Fluid Management Adoption Pack is now being finalised as part of work to implement the Innovation Health and Wealth plans published late last year. My time is balanced between supporting the NTAC team and participating in a number of the national working groups. I am most looking forward to discussions about the future support mechanisms for improvements in the NHS and of course how new devices and diagnostics can be identified and adopted more rapidly and widely.
The NTAC team is working at full stretch now to complete the Adoption & Briefing packs for those technologies/products that were successfully submitted by industry partners for adoption by the NHS under the iTAPP programme.
The Department of Health has now confirmed that following discussion with National Clinical Director’s three technologies have been selected for detailed Technology Adoption Packs and we have been working alongside both manufacturers and NHS staff to develop these.
As the Department of Health has now written to the manufacturers we can share the three technologies that we are developing the Technology Adoption Packs for.
Interoperative Fluid Monitoring
The use of Intraoperative Fluid Management technologies helps the anaesthetist to monitor the hydration of the patient during surgery. The subsequent corrective treatment reduces post-operative complications, helps people to recover from surgery more quickly and to go home sooner.
Ultrasound Bladder Scanning
Used by nurses in secondary and community care settings, this clinical device determines whether a patient needs to be fitted with a catheter. The main benefits are a reduction in the number of unnecessary catheterisations and, consequently, in the number of related infections.
NT-proBNP (N-terminal prohormone brain-type natriuretic peptide)
A diagnostic test that is used by GPs and/or secondary care clinicians to detect, diagnose and evaluate the severity of heart failure. The principle benefits are a reduction in referrals for further investigations, e.g. echocardiogram (ECG). The test can also be used to monitor drug therapy in patients with confirmed heart failure; aiming to reduce the number of visits to hospital.
We are really proud of our role in this project as it allows us to focus on providing our NHS colleagues with key facts and tools to assist them to adopt innovative technologies that have proven patient benefit.
This week has been a very busy week for NTAC. As well as all the positive work we are engaged in with the NHS I have also been spreading the ‘innovation’ word with two further speaking engagements.
The first being ‘NHS Innovation: Improving the Quality of Care Conference’ in London and the second, the NHS Confederation Conference in Leeds ‘The Future of Innovation: Meeting the QIPP Challenge’.
Our conference programme is really gathering momentum with audiences really engaging with the fact that, if approached systematically innovation is not impossible to attain within the NHS. The examples of work we are able to show, such as the breast lymph node assay project which prevents women from having to undergo a second operation and has potential savings to the NHS of £5 million per annum or the insulin pump therapy project which can, quite literally, transform the life of a diabetic. What really engages and resonates with the audiences is the fact that innovation isn’t just about cost savings. The benefits are far more wide reaching and, in fact, our mantra is that it should always be about the patient first and ensuring NHS patients have a positive experience of the NHS. No one can argue with that…
We have just completed a really interesting project which looked at the impact of telehealth technology used to monitor patients with COPD. Telehealth has been pitched as the ‘future’ for a while now but with few projects actually being put into practice we were keen to see how this technology might be used to help patients with this condition which causes around 25,000 deaths per year.
The results of the project were incredibly positive and showed that telehealth has the potential to considerably improve NHS efficacy in this area.
Topline results were:
The NHS Trust we worked with were able to:
• Reduce emergency admissions to hospital by 21 per cent
• Reduce patient hospital stay by 25 per cent and
• Reduce the number of patients who were admitted to hospital following their attendance to A&E.
This has proved to be a really exciting project and we are actively seeking other telehealth projects as we believe this area has significant potential for the NHS.
It was another busy week for NTAC last week. On Thursday I spoke at a ‘one of a kind meeting on innovation in the NHS’ which was organised by the NHS Confederation, the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI) and the Association of British Healthcare Industries (ABHI).
The title of my piece was ‘Making Innovation ‘Core Business’ for the NHS’ and was well received by the audience. So much so that Pharma Times, writing about the need to bring innovation to the NHS, referenced a section of my presentation where I detailed how a strategic approach is necessary for getting innovations adopted faster throughout the NHS. To read the entire piece visit http://www.pharmatimes.com/Article/12-02-07/We_ll_trade_prices_for_uptake_in_UK_market_says_ABPI.aspx
This week I’ve spent two fascinating days in Vienna participating in and talking at a conference about personalized medicine, which was organised by NextLevel Pharma.
It was fascinating to hear about the potential benefits that these “disruptively innovative” technologies could bring to us all. The pace of change and development seems to be so rapid and I suspect that from both a regulatory and adoption perspective the NHS is going to struggle to keep up, let alone being able to make sure that both patients and practitioners are up to date with these opportunities.
One lovely analogy was how 10 years ago we were all so wary about the internet and the notion of on line shopping and banking and now most of us use our phones to do this every day.
Personalised medicine, watch this space I think ……..
Yesterday we held our 2012 launch event which, by all accounts, was a tremendous success. Regardless of whether an event is personal or corporate there is always a level of anticipation focussed on whether people will arrive, particularly on a wet Wednesday in January!
I am delighted to report that over 40 guests attended including clinicians, industry and government departments such as NICE who were all keen to understand how our organisation is developing and changing in response to the new NHS landscape. 2012 is a pivotal year for us as we bring together our learning and experience from previous projects, utilise the expertise of a newly created team as we tackle a solid pipeline of work and publish the results of a number of vital projects scheduled for conclusion in the next couple of months. Exciting times ahead….
Happy New Year to all our visitors
NTAC is starting 2012 with a bang.
On the 11th of January we are holding our “launch” event to mark the progress we have made in the last 12 months, including our move to new premises in Manchester City Centre as well as the recruitment of an experienced and skilled new team who are primed and ready to support the NHS meet the challenges ahead.
We are continuing to talk with our colleagues at the Department of Health re the outcome of the Innovation Review and how NTAC will continue to support the NHS and Industry to benefit from the opportunity Innovation provides. Work is well underway to deliver detailed and practical Adoption and Briefing Packs for the iTAPP Technologies which will be shared with the NHS in the late spring.
I am delighted that we have started to undertake specific work for industry partners on a commercial basis ranging from some small SMEs through to a global communications provider. Likewise just before Christmas we jointly bid with a third party to support NHS organisations in Yorkshire and Humber with their aspiration to rapidly scale up the pace of their innovative activities. We were delighted to be awarded this tender as it provides NTAC with the opportunity to share its expertise and learning in this field whilst increasing the adoption and dissemination of technologies in the NHS.
Sally Chisholm - CEO
Merry Christmas…are we officially allowed to say that now?
The Innovation Review was published two short weeks ago and we welcome the fact that innovation has been placed high on the agenda and seen as central to the NHS achieving its objectives. You may remember we contributed to this review. It is satisfying to know that the positive work of NTAC, as well as our opinions built from this experience, have been used in a document which will help shape the future of the NHS.
I recently spoke at the Westminster Health Forum event on ‘Diabetes – innovation, fostering quality and tackling variations in care’ and received some very positive feedback. A number of other speaker opportunities have been offered since and I’m really delighted at the opportunity to speak with members of the Top Management Programme.
So all in all we approach the Christmas holidays feeling more than positive about the New Year. In a world which is full of uncertainty about the future it is nice to be able to take the positives when they arrive!
Seasons Greetings to you all
Whoever coined Chicago the windy city was not wrong. I have landed in the third largest city in the US which boasts nearly 200 art galleries and more than 7,300 restaurants and it does not disappoint.
However, no sightseeing for me as I am here on important business. I am here with the UK Trade and Investment (UKTI) to attend an event at the British Consulate. My role here is to share examples of British innovation and to motivate organisations across the pond to learn from the positive examples of work we have completed within the NHS.
This is an exciting project to be involved with and testament to the positive work NTAC has, and is still doing, here in the UK. I’Il keep you posted on developments on my return.
