Central London Community Healthcare (CLCH) has published its annual review on the use of digital technologies in health and care across London and Hertfordshire, in areas such as wound management, appointment management and hospital-at-home services. Here, we take a look at some of the feedback and figures shared by the trusts with regards to its technology use.
In South and West Hertfordshire, where community nursing and care home teams have been using secure digital health app Isla to allow clinicians to upload images of wounds and patient information to one central place, the review shares how more than 3,841 patients in Hertfordshire are now on the system. It has been used for 23,790 submissions since February of 2022.
Elsewhere, digital appointment system DrDoctor was piloted in Harrow’s podiatry service. From April to July of 2023, 23,000 appointments were confirmed and more than 480 extra appointments were attended; the review estimates that the system has saved 143 administrative days, and led to a 24 percent reduction in missed appointments.
With regards to digital technology for patients living with Parkinson’s, the review notes that since 2019, when a wearable device for patients with Parkinson’s was piloted, 54 percent of the patients given the device have had their medication altered to better support them as a result. The wearable device is capable of supplying data on subjects such as patients’ tremors, involuntary movement and slow movement of limbs, and also provides reminders to patients to take medication.
Another project highlighted in the review is the ‘virtual hospital’ established in collaboration with West Hertfordshire Teaching Hospitals, for patients with COPD, heart failure and acute respiratory infections. The review states that the project has “offered a safe alternative to inpatient care for over 5,000 patients and saved countless bed days,” with feedback from patients said to be “overwhelmingly positive”.
Finally, CLCH shares how adult community services in Wandsworth worked with the central quality improvement team to create a bespoke National Early Warning Score app, with the aim of helping community-based clinicians to “quickly and accurately” identify deterioration. 92.5 percent of all clinicians in CLCH’s adult services have been trained in how to use it; the app has been rolled out to all adult community services in the trust, and learnings from the development of the app have been shared with other community healthcare providers.
The review can be found in full here.
In other news from the region, South West London ICB has shared how a digtal system is being used at a practice in Kingston to triage patients.
Work is also underway on expanding the London Care Record with the aim of supporting health and care staff in neighbouring areas with visibility of relevant information when people from outside London are referred for treatment and care in the capital.
