Medtech-iQ Tāmaki Makaurau is looking for any ideas for issues or problems clinically that could be improved or solved with a technology-based solution that is not currently available. The problem could be hospital/clinic-based or in the community and could cover any condition.
Later in the year, we will be proposing these to the MedTech research community in New Zealand to be solved collaboratively at an event with the potential for further funding to then take these to application. We have recently launched Medtech-iQ Aotearoa, and this event will be one of our first for Tāmaki Makaurau.
Any wild and wonderful ideas are welcome! Please comment below or send me a personal message.
At this stage we are just looking to identify some pain points in clinical workflow/practice or the ‘health challenges’ and then if you are in Tāmaki Makaurau there is absolutely opportunity to be a part of the project team that comes up with the solution for this event and progress it to this further stage. At this stage we are just running it in Tāmaki Makaurau but it is likely to also progress throughout the country at a later date.
I’m currently on Urology at ACH. Their House Officers call pre-op patients every day to ask them to get a urine sample to the lab, however, they then follow-up with a phone call to see if/when it’s been done as they can’t see it on the system. House Officers time is so precious.
Extraction and processing of biometric and activity data from wearables (watches/fitbits), and ingestion into a patient record or portal suitable for supporting primary care interactions.
Pharmacist here. We have eScripts now which are great. But we still have to print them off then scan them into the system and enter as normal. The entire system could and should be automated: Clinician writes script in medtech- script is uploaded automatically to Toniq or dispensing software–AI selects the funded brand, checks for interactions and writes a patient appropriate label—sent to robot which dispenses the medication–sent to checking robot for final check then packaged and couriered to patient same day. With that you free up 3000 clinicians from menial tasks who can all move onto things like medication optimisation. The way we do it now feels like the technology of 50 years ago.
A solution for loneliness challenges to help with connection: an app that shows all the different community courses available nearby - or something that can read them out in the morning or the evening before.
The health effects of loneliness are a long way out of my clinical swim lane. I wonder if combating loneliness or similar would be a fantastic use for the current LLM, especially if plugged into one of the voice assistants Big Tech rolled out. In this use case, responsiveness and coherence are the key metrics for conversation as opposed to accuracy if the aim is to combat loneliness. If it goads the user into a reaction, then so much the better.
Of course, they could just get a cat or a dog but comparing the effect of a companion animal to AI sounds like a fun research project.
Not that wild, I could see it using RFID chips in equipment, beds or patient wrist bands. Would just need the readers installed in the building to give a location.
the amount of money lost on equipment replacement due to loss is a sizeable amount of $$
Thinking of patients that wander off from their beds due to MH or age related issues , i’m sure that would improve patient safety by giving the orderlies a much quicker route to finding them.
@Kevin-Maloney we had a great session at the Clinical Digital Academy last month on this subject. Do we or don’t we want this type of data in the clinical record? It was a good debate.
Any conclusions or key themes?
I think it’s a fascinating area, as the Apples and Googles will no doubt throw huge resources at the data set (which they get from “their” devices). People will hopefully still own their raw data , but I suspect Apple and Google will want to monetize the AI-generated implications of the data.
Health diagnosis currently depends very heavily on human examination, and a relatively small set of good quality measured data.
Wearables might expand that data set to a million times it’s current size (although mostly quite low quality). Practitioners will need new tools and guidelines to summarize, understand and incorporate the meaning of this data.
“every breath you take , every move you make, AI will be watching you” (with apologies to Sting)
Not really, just made for a good old fashioned debate.
I felt the consensus fell to ‘No’, at this stage this type of data should not be included in the patient (EHR) clinical record, but there’s always the notion it sits in a “My Health Record” space?
The loneliness comment is really interesting. Jeff Garrett did some work in Middlemore with a very basic ‘robot’ for people in the community with lung disease where the robot could show instructional videos on how to use the inhalers correctly and remind people to take them each day etc. It seemed to me to be a very basic level of interaction from a smaller version of Marvin from the (godawful) H2G2 film, but with less personality.
Noticeably when the study ended people were quite sad to have the robot returned to the study team. Even the (to most of us negligible) level of interaction was greater than many of the patients normally had, suggesting very severe social isolation. It did make me wonder exactly how awfully lonely everyday life must be if having a white face on wheels smiling at you became a highlight of the day…
Meanwhile back on topic, currently we have no consistent way of knowing if a patient has turned up to outpatients and is in the waiting room. Or where in the hospital particular patient might be, with any ease anyway. There’s such a lack of basic functionality that it’s hard to make progress with the more imaginative stuff. The latter is as far as I can see a software issue but the OPD issue is a human failure more often than not - but most weeks I will find someone in the waiting room who hasn’t been “arrived” and so I thought had failed to attend. Bellowing into the waiting area to see if the DNAs are there after all doesn’t look very professional!
Something i have always had issue with too. There is tech out there, geo-fencing or RFID tags for inpatient tracking. Kiosks will allow the patient to self check in, but it has to be simple enough for the patient to want to use it to ensure equity.
We are very keen to push research in the data collection and analysis end of healthcare and this has its place, but i feel we sometimes overlook the nuts and bolts of day to day functionality such as patient arrival, communications and tracking.
Q. As @Blittlechild asks, what are the challenges with RTLS? i.e., OP reception handing out patients a tag, card, or bracelet with an embedded RFID chip upon registration? An RPA bot could update the PAS based on this.
Assuming cost is the main barrier? i.e. unsure of the magnitude of the problem…
