Category: project-09

New research and short film highlights benefits to patient care of mobile APP

Posted on by CLAHRC

New CLAHRC research shows the impact of the “Streams-AKI” app

Detection of one of the biggest killers in the NHS – Acute Kidney Injury (AKI) –  has been cut from hours to minutes thanks to the introduction of a new mobile app.

Working in partnership with Deepmind and the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust, CLAHRC researchers based at UCL evaluated the impact of the digital intervention-  an App called Streams – and the clinical pathway it underpins – on safety and clinical outcomes for inpatients at risk of AKI.

The STREAMs app sends an instant alert to NHS staff if a patients test results show they are is at risk of Acute Kidney Injury

AKI is a sudden episode of kidney failure or kidney damage defined by changes in urine output or serum creatinine – a waste product filtered by our kidneys. AKI can affect other organs such as the brain, heart, and lungs. It is common in hospital inpatients, in intensive care units, and especially older adults. AKI is estimated to cause 40,000 deaths and cost the NHS over £1 billion every year.

We compared results between the hospital site using the app versus another site not using the app. The evaluation of Streams highlighted a significant improvement in the reliability of recognition, time to treatment and reduced costs.

A short film summarises the results of our evaluation which took place from May 2017 across the Trust.

Mary Emerson, lead nurse specialist for the patient at risk and resuscitation team, with patient Edgar Ferrante.

The short film accompanies three papers published today (July 31st)

The research generated a great deal of media coverage which included an appearance on BBC Breakfast by CLAHRC Director Professor Rosalind Raine

..and a news item on the BBC website

Read the papers below

Connell A, Raine R, Martin P, Barbosa EC, Morris S, Nightingale C, Sadeghi-Alavijeh O, King D, Karthikesalingam A, Hughes C, Back T, Ayoub K, Suleyman M, Jones G, Cross J, Stanley S, Emerson M, Merrick C, Rees G, Montgomery H, Laing C
Implementation of a Digitally Enabled Intervention to Detect and Treat Acute Kidney Injury Arising in Hospitalized Patients: Evaluation of Impact on Clinical Outcomes and Associated Health Care Costs
J Med Internet Res 2019;21(7):e13147
http://www.jmir.org/2019/7/e13147

Connell A, Black G, Montgomery H, Martin P, Nightingale C, King D, Karthikesalingam A, Hughes C, Back T, Ayoub K, Suleyman M, Jones G, Cross J, Stanley S, Emerson M, Merrick C, Rees G, Laing C, Raine R
A Qualitative Evaluation of User Experiences of a Digitally Enabled Care Pathway in Secondary Care
J Med Internet Res 2019;21(7):e13143
http://www.jmir.org/2019/7/e13143/

Alistair Connell  Hugh Montgomery, Peter Martin Claire Nightingale Omid Sadeghi-Alavijeh, Dominic KingAlan Karthikesalingam, Cian Hughes, Trevor Back, Kareem Ayoub, Mustafa Suleyman, Gareth Jones, Jennifer Cross,
Sarah Stanley, Mary Emerson, Charles Merrick, Geraint Rees, Chris Laing and Rosalind Raine
Evaluation of a digitally-enabled care pathway for acute kidney injury management in hospital emergency admissions
npj Digital Medicine (2019) 2:67
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41746-019-0100-6

 

 

 

 

How can we help Emergency Departments better prepare for the arrival of patients with acute mental health problems?

Posted on by CLAHRC

New CLAHRC research offers the NHS a great opportunity to better support patients with mental health issues arriving at Emergency Departments.

CLAHRC researcher Dr Helen Barratt and colleagues have used NHS data to describe the population of patients who attend Emergency Departments in England, including their sociodemographic characteristics. As part of the first national study of Emergency Department mental health attendances, the researchers analysed over 6 million adult visits at 97 English NHS Trusts between April 2013 and March 2014.

The data will be invaluable to the NHS in estimating the demand for liaison psychiatry services, and resourcing A & E departments to deal with patients presenting with mental health issues in what is already a stressful environment. This work is timely as recently new NHS Access standards for emergency mental health care have been proposed – obliging Trusts to strengthen the availability of care ‘out of hours’ and the provision of resources for individuals requiring admission.

“Those coming to A&E will receive a response from a 24/7 liaison psychiatry team (or equivalent children’s and young people’s service) within the first hour of their referral, and will receive the appropriate, timely support to meet their needs and an evidence-based package of care.”
Clinically-led Review of NHS Access Standards Interim Report from the NHS National Medical Director

You can see the key figures in the infographic below

 

You can see more of the key figures in a presentation Helen put together below

 

 

Dr Antonio Rojas-Garcia

Posted on by CLAHRC

Antonio holds a BSc in Psychology and an MSc in Research Methods and Implementation in Psychology and Health, both from the University of Granada, Spain. He has also been awarded a Ph.D. from the University of Granada, for his work in the Andalusian School of Public Health. During this time, he was part of several research projects, mostly focused on health inequalities and health systems, prior to joining UCL.  Antonio has particular interest in research methods in health, mostly systematic reviews and meta-analysis.

Dr Antonio Rojas-Garcia

Posted on by CLAHRC

Antonio holds a BSc in Psychology and an MSc in Research Methods and Implementation in Psychology and Health, both from the University of Granada, Spain. He has also been awarded a Ph.D. from the University of Granada, for his work in the Andalusian School of Public Health. During this time, he was part of several research projects, mostly focused on health inequalities and health systems, prior to joining UCL.  Antonio has particular interest in research methods in health, mostly systematic reviews and meta-analysis.

Andrew Hutchings

Posted on by Joshua Olins

Andrew studied management science (operational research) at Lancaster University. He has worked in industry and spent five years at the Audit Commission. He joined the Department of Health Services Research and Policy at LSHTM after completing a MSc in Medical Statistics. His main research interests are in the area of health care quality improvement, service delivery and organisational research. Recent research has included work examing the routine use of patient reported outcomes measures (PROMs) in elective surgery and TABUL, a NIHR HTA-funded study comparing the performance of ultrasonography and temporal artery biopsy for diagnosing giant cell arteritis.