On Wednesday 19th June we were delighted to be invited to speak on the main stage at Facebook HQ in London for the “Digitally Transforming Primary Care – Making it Happen at Scale” conference, where Phil shared Simple Telehealth’s journey from its inception to the unique international Community of Practice we support today.
The event was hosted jointly by Facebook and the NHS Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire CCG Digital Nurse Ambassador Programme. Who following a hugely successful pilot, were granted funding to embark on a series of action learning events to support the spread and adoption of technology and social media tools across Primary Care Networks in England.
The agenda for the day was led by Dr Ruth Chambers OBE, Clinical Lead for Technology Enabled Care Services in the Staffordshire STP, and offered valuable insight and practical advice for NHS Leaders, commissioners and clinicians about how technology and digital tools can be used at scale to support the care delivered to patients.
Delegates were also given the opportunity to ask questions of the Digital Nurse Ambassadors and heard from both clinical teams and patient groups across the UK who shared their enthusiasm and experiences; with examples of where they have been able to successfully incorporate technology in their local practice to improve outcomes, and engage with patients with education about their health and wellbeing.
Phil spoke about the need for a reality check before engaging with any of the thousands of digital ‘solutions’ being promoted for healthcare and talked about how today’s market is rife with ‘snake oil’. He went on to encourage delegates to look for technologies with substantial independent evidence of efficacy and to be clear about how and why they will use digital. Phil endorsed the Digital Nurse programme with it’s clear and uncomplicated agenda and it’s aim of helping patients to help themselves in the simplest of ways, which consistent with the researched evidence base behind Simple Telehealth, can consistently deliver better and faster clinical outcomes.
Ann Hughes, who is a Digital Nurse Ambassador from Stoke-on-Trent and is part of the team facilitating the National Action Learning Event programme, joined Phil for his session to share her own personal experiences of using Flo to support her patients.
Ann had an elderly patient who needed to have cataract surgery, however disappointingly the surgery was cancelled due to a high blood pressure reading taken at her pre-op appointment. To determine whether this patient had hypertension or white coat syndrome, Ann signed her up to Flo and the patient sent in her BP readings. With Flo, the patient’s BP was shown to be within the normal range which then enabled the surgery to go ahead despite the white-coat readings at pre-op. “.. by the middle of the week I’d got enough readings to be able to print them off and fax them over to the pre-op team…and they did the operation based on those readings.”
More from Ann:
“.. I use Flo extensively in my practice… it’s just so easy to use and saves time..”
“.. the impact for this lady was massive… it changed her life.”
“.. that’s as simple as it is. It’s so easy to use, patients feel at home with it… and trust in it.“
We’d like to thank Facebook for their hospitality and congratulate Ruth and the team on a really fantastic day, hopefully the first of many! You can find out more about the event and view the presentations from the day via this link Digitally Transforming Primary Care – Making it Happen at Scale Conference.
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#Facebook #Digitally Transforming Primary Care #NHS Stoke-on-Trent #Staffordshire CCG #Digital Nurse Ambassador Programme #TotallyUnique
