The Department of Health & Social Care have today published a 10 Year Health Plan for England.
Commenting on behalf of the Royal Academy of Engineering, Professor Becky Shipley OBE FREng, Chair of Future of Neighbourhood Health Services Working Group, Professor of Healthcare Engineering at UCL and Chief Research Officer at UCLPartners said:
“We welcome the long-awaited 10 Year Health Plan which sets out transformational shifts in how health and care services are planned, delivered and accessed and aims to future proof the NHS for the decade ahead.”
“As the National Academy of engineering and technology, we have long called for an engineering systems approach for the transformation of our health and care system that looks beyond the boundaries of the NHS. The focus on a neighbourhood health service offers a real opportunity for join up across health and care, as well as voluntary sectors and wider infrastructure. We’re excited to help achieve this goal with our project focused on how systems design and technology can meaningfully contribute to the delivery of neighbourhood health services for ageing coastal communities.”
“From our experience supporting health spinouts and start-ups, we know engaging with the NHS can be a challenge. The new ‘innovator passport’ is a welcome introduction. It is right that where we have assurances a new technology has been robustly assessed by one NHS organisation, it can be easily rolled out to others. This approach will open doors for innovation, reduce barriers to market, and, most importantly, means patients will get effective treatments and support quicker.”
“A vision which embraces innovation and sets out to make the NHS a global leader in medical technology is welcomed by the Academy. However, as we move from analogue to digital, care must be taken to understand and identify the challenges on the ground. We must ensure that technologies adopted are the right solutions: they need to be developed collaboratively, with appropriate safeguards, and supported by the necessary infrastructure and training.”
