Ileana Welte – more information

February 28, 2016 | by

Following our note a week ago announcing the deeply distressing news about Ileana’s sudden death, we have received many tributes to her. We thought therefore that readers might also be interested in:

We are expecting a tribute shortly from Bosch to add to this, and also information on her memorial service, so please check back regularly.

In the meantime, in the words of Sylvia Christie of BWW, please do share if you feel able to – tributes to Ileana are proving a great comfort to her family.

The Accelerated Access Review – a personal journey

February 23, 2016 | by
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/AAR-logo.jpg” thumb_width=”200″ /]The Accelerated Access Review (AAR) aims to speed up access by NHS patients to innovative medicines, medtech and diagnostics, and digital health. Of these, digital health is the newest, and because it enables care to be delivered in a far more efficient and patient-centric way, offers great hope for the future of improved patient outcomes and controlled costs.

As someone outside government who was drawn into the digital health stream of the AAR, this blog aims to capture key learnings from the experience.

Challenges

The initial list of obstacles to innovation in the NHS was depressingly long, until carefully differentiated. Top of the pile were items like the NHS’s asymmetric attitude to risk – successful innovations are forgotten, unsuccessful innovations are a life sentence for those involved – which are soluble only by those at the very top.

Then there were the surmountable challenges – for example the fear, uncertainty and doubt over digital health regulation was overcome by (more…)

Ileana Welte

February 20, 2016 | by | 18 Comments

– Many readers will be deeply saddened to know that Ileana Welte died of a heart attack last Wednesday whilst travelling on the Tube in London.

Many will know her from her long time working in Bosch in the UK, where she was particularly associated with the NHS Direct telehealth service, and more recently her management of the UK side of Big White Wall where she was doing a brilliant job driving the uptake of digital health in the NHS to help treat people with mental health problems.

She will be very sorely missed; her untimely death has come as a huge shock to many.

We will shortly be publishing a larger article with contributions from Bosch, Big White Wall and from ex NHS Direct colleagues – other contributions will be gratefully received. We will also publish news of her funeral/memorial services when received.

 

“Mainstreaming medical apps; reducing NHS costs; improving patient outcomes” – a brief summary

May 10, 2015 | by

What follows is a brief summary of the presentations given at the Royal Society of Medicine’s third “Appday”, held on 9th April 2015. All three events have been sell-outs.

Anne Hayes, Head of Market Development at BSI, opened the event with an excellent presentation on the then shortly-to-be-finalised PAS 277 on mHealth apps (now available, free, here). She particularly welcomed the opportunity to present to clinicians, as too often her audience was primarily technologists. The presentation was especially impressive because Anne had only agreed to do the presentation the previous Friday, following realisation by both MHRA & NICE that proximity to the election meant neither could present. Anne explained that PAS 277, as a Publicly Available Specification, is not mandatory – it is essentially a checklist for developers and purchasers of medical apps to consider.

Julie Bretland, CEO of OurMobileHealth, then presented on the preliminary conclusions of the NIB Workstream 1.2 on how best to approve medical apps. (more…)

Medical Innovations Summit at the Royal Society of Medicine April 5 2014

April 7, 2014 | by

The RSM held another of its innovation summits last Saturday. In addition to the 13 stimulating presentations, the morning was excellently hosted by past RSM President Robin Williamson whose stand-up comedy skills are surely a close match for his well-known surgical expertise.

The first presentation, from Big White Wall, an online provider of personalised mental health services, was begun by founder Jen Hyatt. She quoted hugely impressive statistics of how 95% of users report feeling better, 80% feel able to take control of their lives and 73% share their feelings for the first time when using the wall. She described how they use a ‘social media scraper’ and algorithms to assess people’s state of mind and suggest treatment plans. Dr Simon Wilson, Clinical director, said there was good evidence that online mental health therapy is as effective as face:face.  He went on to explain in more detail how the service was provided and what steps were taken when people posted genuinely concerning material. This is a superb innovation.

This was followed by Dr Farid Khan, CEO of PharmaKure, a company that looks for  (more…)