Coordinating digital health and care activity

Digital transformation has a major role to play in supporting all health and care services to quickly change how they operate to offer a more digital-first service offer for patients.  This activity is being seen by a new multi-agency COVID-19 digital coordination group to take urgent decisions, ensure delivery of priorities and ensure all activities remain directly relevant to COVID-19 for the duration of the crisis.

The AHSN Network

As an AHSN and part of The AHSN Network we are supporting our partners across the NHS and social care by helping them take full advantage of the most relevant innovations and technologies that can improve care for patients and support our services in this challenging context. Nationally, the AHSN Network is part of a coordinated NHS response to identify and enable the implementation of technologies that respond to areas of highest priority action, in particular solutions for remote consultation and patient monitoring, diagnostics and point-of-care testing.

Similarly, AHSNs in each region are part of a system-wide approach, led by our regional NHS offices, to support our local health and care organisations – connecting them with potential solutions and offering up the specific operational or clinical skillsets of our teams where relevant. This includes Patient Safety Collaboratives, who will be adapting their specialist skills towards keeping patients safe in these very demanding environments.

For more information about how AHSNs and The AHSN Network is supporting the response to COVID-19 visit The AHSN Network website.

Head to our Innovation Nexus for more information on how to contact us with your innovations – click here.

Industry engagement

All AHSNs within the AHSN Network are actively supporting the NHS and social care system regarding the Covid-19 pandemic.

If you would like advice on immediate or future needs, and how best to present your offer to local and/ or national commissioners, please contact the commercial team at Health Innovation Manchester  here.

The government has provided national guidance on where to register products to support the COVID-19 response. Please find these details below.

PPE (Personal Protection Equipment)
Contact the Surgical MedTech Co-operative (one of NIHR’s Medtech and In vitro diagnostics Co-operatives) if you have a technology that could be adapted quickly for the healthcare setting to help protect healthcare workers against aerosol contamination.

Find out more about their ‘COVID-19 PPE Challenge’ here.

Vaccines
Contact Public Health England: nervtag@phe.gov.uk

Ventilators
Contact the Government’s Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS): ventilator.support@beis.gov.uk or call 0300 456 3565

Innovation and Tech
Contact NHSX: DNHSX@nhsx.nhs.uk

Diagnostics
Contact Public Health England: coviddiagnostics@phe.gov.uk

General
The UK government has set up a service allowing businesses to share any support that might help the COVID-19 response, from PPE and medical testing equipment to transport/logistics and warehouse space. Find out more here.

If you have any other solutions (not specifically COVID-19 related) that could be useful to the health and care system during this unprecedented time, you can access AHSN advice and support by visiting www.ahsninnovationexchange.co.uk.

Patient Safety Collaborative

Greater Manchester and Eastern Cheshire Patient Safety Collaborative, hosted by Health Innovation Manchester, is supporting the local health and care systems during the response to the COVID-19 outbreak in hospitals, care homes and the community.

All 15 Patient Safety Collaboratives, as part of the NHS National Patient Safety Improvement Programmes (NatPatSIPs), will focus on the following priorities over the next six months:

• Identifying and managing people at risk of deterioration and sepsis
• Implementing a tracheostomy care programme to help manage patients with a tracheostomy
• Support for patients being discharged from hospital with COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease)
• Support for maternity and neonatal units

Find out more about the Greater Manchester and Eastern Cheshire Patient Safety Collaborative here

Find out more about the patient safety work taking place nationally on the AHSN Network website here