Health Technologies

News in Brief: NHS Transformation Directorate and Digital Social Care develop e-learning, proton beam therapy trial launches, Oxford Hospitals opens imaging service and more – htn

It’s time for another news in brief and as always there has been plenty happening in the health tech community…

NHS Transformation Directorate and Digital Social Care create training for information sharing

NHS Transformation Directorate has been working alongside Digital Social Care in developing new e-learning sessions to help social care staff better understand principles of sharing information.

The information sharing programme is being aimed at colleagues working within social care settings and their supervisors who have a responsibility for managing and sharing information.

The resource aims to help the learners to understand principles behind information sharing, how to apply them in practice and build confidence in using and sharing.

Find out more here.

North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust invites visitors from Health Ministry of Israel

North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust has welcomed visitors from the Health Ministry of Israel including Etsi Shelly, Director of Digital Health in the Israeli Ministry of Health, Oshrat Attar-Schneider, Director of the Israeli Telemedicine Community and Hodaya Avzada, Head of Domestic and Civil Society Affairs Department, to share good practice in digital transformation.

The visit included a tour of the trust’s two hospital sites and an overview of recent improvements and ongoing projects, including the virtual ward programme, new digital system OPTICA which aims to improve patient flow, and CareScan+ barcode tech which is designed to track and trace products used by staff.

Gillian Colquhoun, Chief Information and Technology Officer, said: “We were delighted to be able to host professionals from another country’s health system. It was a fantastic opportunity to share with them some of our challenges and successes as we look to improve our use of digital technology in patient care.

“The Health Ministry of Israel has experienced a great deal of success in this area over recent years and we are very keen to share good practice with them. This is the first of what we hope will be an ongoing partnership with them as we look to continue our digital transformation of services.”

University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust partners to create helicopter incubator

Southampton Oxford Neonatal Transport Service and their national charity have introduced a helicopter incubator for babies who are critically ill, with help from University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust clinicians.

The Children’s Air Ambulance (TCAA) has placed the incubator on a rotary-wing aircraft to help specialist NHS transportation teams throughout lifesaving flights. The incubator will be used to maintain environmental conditions that are acceptable for a newborn baby.

The TCAA provides an intensive care aircraft that helps to transfer critically ill babies and children at a high and safe speed to get from local hospitals to specialist paediatric and neonatal treatment centres.

Oxford University Hospitals opens a new multidisciplinary imaging service

Oxford University Hospitals (OUH) NHS Foundation Trust has opened a multidisciplinary imaging and interventional centre, which is based at the John Radcliffe Hospital.

The centre is designed to support several clinical services such as neuroradiology, neurosurgery and interventional cardiology, along with a number of non-invasive imaging services such as OUH’s cardiac CT service. It also provides a hybrid photon-counting CT scanner with an interventional suite which is supported by an artificial intelligence facility.

The centre’s Director Professor Charalambos Antoniades said that it is “built to deliver state-of-the-art multidisciplinary research by providing the research infrastructure linking interventional, non-invasive imaging and artificial intelligence/big data capabilities. It will also focus on education and clinical training, as well as clinical care for the benefit of our patients.”

Leeds Children Hospital implants Venus P Valve

The Congenital Cardiology Intervention Team at Leeds Children’s Hospital has implanted a Venus P pulmonary heart valve into an adult congenital heart disease patient.

The new device, trialled at Leeds Children’s Hospital, enables patients to have a day-case key hole procedure, thus avoiding open heart surgery, prolonged recovery and a long stay in hospital. The P Valve is inserted by a catheter through a small incision into the groin which is then fed through an artery into position in the heart. When it is in position the device is deployed carefully, expending to the fill the valve of a patient.

Dr Jamie Bentham lead the procedure and said: “It is a real honour to have been asked to perform the procedure and fantastic for our patients that new technology is allowing us to treat them with key hole procedures rather than open heart surgery.”

New equipment helps patients stay entertained during hospital stay

Somerset NHS Foundation Trust has introduced the RITA system – Reminiscence/Rehabilitation & Interactive Therapy Activities. The system is a movable touchscreen monitor designed to patients to stay engaged during recovery.

It holds thousands of films for patients to watch, including content to bring back memories from the 50s and 60s, which older patients are likely to have been familiar with when they were young.

Professor Dave Thomas, Interim Director of Nursing Strategy and Transformation and Chief Nursing Information Officer, said: “There are two schools of thought in how best to calm patients and connect them to where they are, and help them understand what is happening. The first is about connecting patients to the right here, right now. Either by immersing them in an activity like a puzzle so they are present in the minute, or for our patients who have woken up in intensive care, re-orientating them on the time of day, month and season.

He added: “We find that many of our patients with dementia tend to struggle in the twilight hours of 4pm and 6pm, so the RITA is great to be able to engage with patients as well as bring out their personality, so we can personalise their care and activities on what matters to them.”

Proton beam therapy trial launches

A trial has been launched to test the benefits of proton beam therapy for specific patients with breast cancer, to help determine if proton beam therapy can help to deliver sufficient doses of radiotherapy to breast tissue, while minimising radiation transformed to the heart.

The PARABLE trial is being led by researchers at The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust; The University of Cambridge; The Institute of Cancer Research, London, and controlled by the Cancer Research UK-funded Clinical Trials and Statistics Unit at The Institute of Cancer Research (ICR).

It will enrol 192 people across 22 sites in the UK. People who are to receive the therapy will be treated at The Christie NHS Foundation Trust in Manchester or the University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.

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