Digital infrastructure supporting health care during the COVID-19 pandemic

Healthcare is a key frontline service in the response to the COVID-19 outbreak. The NHS has had to react at pace to plan and deliver services in new and innovative ways.

Digital healthcare solutions are at the fore of ensuring not only the delivery of acute care for those patients suffering from COVID-19 but are also supporting the successful continuity of care and the day to day running of a health service which still needs to maintain “normal service” as well as its pandemic response. Digital infrastructure is helping the NHS and other partners to adapt and to meet the demand for health and care in a number of ways.

Supporting the delivery of care

In many ways, the NHS and frontline care in particular were already making inroads towards transitioning to digital and online platforms before the pandemic emerged. Many GP surgeries allow online appointment booking, and where appropriate, monitoring of those with long term conditions can be done remotely through at-home testing facilities, such as home heart monitors or monitors to help people monitor their diabetes.

Many care providers also already offer telehealth solutions for clients, and patient records are now stored online. However, in many ways the COVID-19 pandemic has catalysed uptake of digital solutions to healthcare diagnosis and delivery, with an increase in online consultations, greater use of the NHS Digital and NHS24 online and app platforms and a rise in the development of digital solutions to better support care in the community.

Support and training for frontline staff

In addition to supporting the direct delivery of care to patients, digital health infrastructure is also being adapted and used to deliver training and support to staff on the frontline. Blogs and online forums, including social media groups are enabling people to share experiences and best practice, and to create a sense of community among healthcare workers. In addition, virtual and e-learning opportunities are being developed to enable staff to access educational activities remotely. These include supporting the rapid education of the healthcare workforce in how best to manage the respiratory conditions encountered, as well as providing education to staff who may have been redeployed to other departments or settings as a result of the pandemic response. Online learning has also been used to help train volunteers and help the public to keep up to date with the latest developments across the health service.

Beyond healthcare to support the response to the pandemic

Artificial intelligence and data analytics also have a vital role to play in helping prevent the spread of coronavirus and other infectious diseases as digital solutions look to be developed to help beyond acute healthcare responses.

Predictive analytics and scenario modelling can be used to help identify those populations who are at risk of spreading the virus and of falling most severely ill to help support shielding campaigns and protect vulnerable groups as lockdown measures ease.

A project run by UK firm Biobank is looking to use samples collected by volunteers to map genetic sequencing in order to identify whether certain genetic characteristics make people more predisposed to become seriously ill, or more likely to contract the virus in the first place. This may help in the development of a vaccine and can also help identify those groups who will be most vulnerable when lockdown conditions are lifted so that they can be monitored more effectively.

Modelling and analytics can also be used to try and project any potential “second waves”. It is hoped that AI, analytics and machine learning will be able to help organisations learn from events such as the SARS epidemic, as well as quickly creating new knowledge from the millions of data points being generated in this outbreak.

Final thoughts

The significant humanitarian response to this global pandemic is being underpinned by a digital infrastructure, the extent of which we have never had at our disposal before. This digital support, of care delivery, communication, analytics, and modelling is being used in conjunction with insight from health and scientific specialists to try and help us find a path through this pandemic, deliver care, aid recovery and prevent re-emergence.

Making best use of the data and digital capacity we have throughout our health and care infrastructure will be a key part in preparing and meeting the needs and challenges that communities are facing.


Follow us on Twitter to see which topics are interesting our research team.

Further reading: articles on COVID-19 from The Knowledge Exchange blog

What technology brings to health and social care: a case study of Calderdale and Idox

 

By Steven McGinty

In the second of our articles on health and social care and technology, we‘re going to look at the advantages of using technology, as well as a case study of an innovative partnership between Calderdale Council and Idox.

The ‘Digital working, learning and information sharing’ strategy, developed in partnership with the adult social care sector, identifies three areas where technology would bring a number of benefits:

  • working directly with those who need care and their carers;
  • supporting the learning and professional development of staff;
  • organisational business support and information management systems.

The use of electronic notes, for instance, would be a simple step that would have a significant impact on homecare workers (highlighted in section 5 of the Burstow Commission report on the future of the home care workforce).  At the moment, care workers usually make handwritten notes and leave them in a book in someone’s home.  However, if care workers moved from handwritten notes to electronic notes, information could be shared more easily. This would mean that care managers and families would be able to monitor an individual’s care and conditions remotely.

Organisations have also seen the advantage of incorporating e-learning into staff development.  The Skills for Care ‘Digital capabilities in social care’ report found that 95% of organisations used e-learning courses to support staff development, particularly in administration-related areas, such as health and safety and fire training. For instance, instead of sending staff on full day training sessions, e-learning courses can be completed by staff in an hour, offering greater efficiency and flexibility.

However, the report also highlighted that social care related e-learning courses, which looked at issues such as dignity and respect, were of ‘variable quality’ and not able to compete with the experience of face-to-face and group learning. Therefore, it’s possible that an opportunity is being missed by education and training providers, as technology should be able to provide better solutions than the simple tick box exercises described in the report.

Interestingly, the report also suggests this might not be too far off, as one of the organisations revealed that they were looking at more interactive options and were currently working on a research project with a university in Greece, which focused on the idea of ‘gamification’.

One local authority that’s certainly tried to capitalise on the benefits of technology is Calderdale Council. The council has developed an innovative case management tool to support their day-to-day work, in areas such as child protection, looked after children, and fostering and adopting. Parveen Akhtar, Early Intervention Service Manager, at Calderdale Council explains that:

“The Child Social Care solution was created in partnership with schools, health and police. Providing an intuitive system to meet the requirements of front line social care practitioners, it enhances our ability to provide better services to families within our community.”

The Child Social Care solution creates a single view of a child through combining information from several sources into one record. This means that practitioners are able to create, access and share information easily and securely, supporting informed decisions and putting in place appropriate support for children and their families.

The system has a number of benefits and features, including:

  • improving multi-agency communication and response;
  • reducing the amount of time taken by practitioners to locate another agency involved in a child’s case;
  • enabling practitioners to access information remotely;
  • offering comprehensive performance and reporting tools for providing vital statistics;
  • providing the ability to monitor and track the progress that children and families are making.

Calderdale have teamed up with Idox, a specialist in providing technology, content and funding solutions to government, and are now offering their system to other local authorities. The partnership has already proven to be successful, with Calderdale and Idox providing their solution to councils in the Isles of Scilly and Leeds.

Over the coming years, health and social care will be facing ever greater demands with tighter budgets. For this reason, technology is going to be essential to support better outcomes and more efficient services.  It is therefore important that a strategic approach is taken concerning information technology, and that organisations look at its long term benefits, rather than the short term savings from cuts to investment.

The first article on health and social care and technology, “What’s preventing health and social care from going digital?”, can be found here.

Further reading: