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 

????️ Canon Medical has introduced a new CT system, Aquilion Serve SP to help healthcare professionals with continuously increasing workload, imaging needs that have become more complex, staff shortages and financial limitations. The Aquilion Serve SP’s 40% reduction in workflow steps saves time, reduces pressure on overloaded staff, and enhances opportunities to serve more patients while preserving optimal accuracy. The new CT system also features INSTINX, Canon Medical’s holistic workflow solution that creates new standards in efficiency and consistency. 

???? DXS, an independent digital healthcare firm, has achieved revolutionary results with the deployment of its SMART referral forms to an NHS Infertility Service. These cutting-edge digital tools are designed to streamline the referral process, ensuring timely and efficient access to specialised healthcare services. Since the implementation of the forms, waiting times have been cut in half, now down to 22 weeks from over 44 weeks. 

???? The blockchain-based AI messaging service ‘UNICE’ has been selected as an ecosystem project by many global VCs. UNICE Lab, founded by medical professionals and medical school professors from Korea, aims to develop ‘UNICE,’ an AI that can handle everything from early disease diagnosis to treatment, and even surgery. This UNICE service, an AI-based blockchain messenger trained by doctors, analyses users’ conversation and voice data to assess their mental and physical health status, providing customized healthcare solutions based on this analysis. 

???? People are more likely to feedback about commercial services and products than their experiences of health and social care, according to new research by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and health and care champion Healthwatch England (HWE). The research is part of a new Share for Better Care campaign launched by CQC and HWE in collaboration with the Race Equality Foundation, National Dignity Council, Royal Association for Deaf people, National Voices, Challenging Behaviour Foundation, the Patients Association, Voice Ability and Disability Rights UK. The campaign aims to encourage everyone to give feedback on their experiences of care, focusing on people more likely to experience poorer care and inequalities who are less likely to give their feedback. 

❓ Did you know that? 

A new study by personal injury expert Claims.co.uk reveals that NHS Gloucestershire patients have to wait the longest for a GP appointment in the country. The study analysed NHS data from England’s 42 Integrated Care Boards (ICB) on GP appointments from July 2021 to December 2023 to identify the one with the longest wait times based on the percentage which took more than 22 days. 

NHS Gloucestershire is first on the list, with 590,950 appointments that took over 22 days to occur, which translates into 12.29% of all appointments. The percentage is well above the other regions below, with almost a 3% difference between the first and second spots. There are 73 GP practices within the region, all of which are members of the board. 

Second is NHS Dorset with 9.57% of appointments that took over 22 days. The value results from 517,519 appointments over 5,408,922, which were processed by approximately 80 practices that are active in the area. 

???? What we’re reading 

Tomorrow’s World Today – AI Could Soon Help Surgeons in the Operating Room  

???? This week’s events 

22 March, online – The role of the independent sector in healthcare delivery