Digital Health Coffee Time Briefing ☕ 

Your morning summary of digital health news, information and events to know about if you want to be “in the know”.   

???? News  

???? Bupa UK Insurance is rolling out a new suite of preventative and proactive wellbeing products and services to all its health insurance customers to help them stay healthy, identify potential risks earlier and ultimately take action towards better health. From January 2024, Bupa customers will be able to access online health and wellbeing services including over 1,500 digital gym classes, fitness programmes such as pilates, yoga and high intensity interval training (HIIT), alongside mindfulness sessions and comprehensive wellbeing resources. 

???? Revvity, Inc. has announced the launch of its EONIS Q system, a CE-IVD declared platform enabling laboratories in countries that accept the CE marking to adopt molecular testing for spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) and severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID) in newborns. For both inherited conditions, immediate detection is critical to advancing a positive outcome. For SMA, disease modifying therapies exist to stop progression of disease, and for SCID, immunoglobulin treatments combined with stem cell therapies can potentially cure a child, if intervention comes in time. However, to date, molecular testing for these and other congenital disorders is relatively low, due in part to cost restrictions and the technical expertise required to perform and interpret these tests. 

???? Recent board papers from Isle of Wight NHS Trust, Solent NHS Trust and Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust revolve around ‘Project Fusion’, which will see a number of their services brought together under a new trust; as part of their meeting, the boards discussed the new trust’s developing digital strategy and digital transition requirements, including plans to develop an EPR roadmap and priority areas of focus for digital. Through Project Fusion, all services from Solent and Southern Health will be brought together under a new NHS trust along with community, mental health and learning disability services provided from the Isle of Wight and child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) from Sussex Partnership NHS Trust, the Health Tech News reports.  

????‍♀️ VentriJect, a Danish MedTech start-up seeking to revolutionise the way cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) is measured, won the 2nd place award at the Healthcare Innovation World Cup earlier this month for its innovation that enables CRF to be estimated without the need for exercise and in less than three minutes.  

???? Bournemouth University has teamed up with ImproveWell, a real-time feedback solution for staff to improve health and care, to use AI to turn NHS frontline workers’ feedback into digestible evidence to support decision-making for the first time. ImproveWell is a digital platform that collects real-time feedback from NHS workers on changes that could improve staff and patient experience. An Innovate UK grant has enabled Bournemouth University and ImproveWell to enter into a Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) to develop bespoke AI models for the platform, building on existing data science and business intelligence capability. 

❓ Did you know that?  

Starting a family is becoming more expensive than ever before. The squeeze on household budgets continue to dictate how families prioritise their money. Patients looking to start a family should always consider the financial implications which it entails. For couples undergoing fertility treatment, the added costs they carry during treatment is deterring a growing number of them to pause their plans of starting a family. Recent data shows 95% of fertility patients are concerned about the financial burden of the cost-of-living crisis, with 49% of respondents suspending their treatment in response to the pressures. 

???? What we’re reading 

AI is not new to health care – there have been efforts to harness its potential since the 1960s. But all of these failed to deliver on their promise, leading to a decades-long ‘AI winter’ in health care. Only now are we starting to see AI’s true potential reveal itself. Why is this? There are two reasons. First, it just needed time to get good. The new versions of AI are fundamentally different from what we’ve had before, and they’re improving every day. And the second reason is the health care ecosystem is ready to take advantage of the technology as never before. These factors combined mean we now find ourselves at a bit of a tipping point when it comes to the potential of health technology, writes Dr. Robert Wachter in this Health Foundation blog. 

???? This week’s events 

29 November 14:00-15:00 – Digital Health Webinar: The Next Evolution of AI: Fully automated clinical documentation 

30 November 09:00-15:00 – Networks Exchange November: ICS Digital Priorities Unveiled – Shaping the Future of NHS