DigitalHealth.London Accelerator Cohort Seven Showcase – Healthy.io

As Cohort Seven of the DigitalHealth.London Accelerator programme comes to a close, we celebrate the remarkable achievements of our participating companies. In the spotlight today is Healthy.io and their digital wound management solution, Minuteful for Wound, a CE-certified specialist digital wound management solution for clinical use.

What is the challenge you are addressing?

In 2017/2018, the cost of chronic wound management was estimated at £8.3 billion, and it is now believed to be closer to £10 billion. Approximately 3.8 million people live with chronic wounds, though these conditions are not always visible. This significantly impacts patient outcomes, with many enduring unnecessary pain, discomfort, and risk of deterioration.

Living with a chronic wound is very difficult and it really makes you think on how you’ve got to go about achieving some things that you’d normally have taken for granted. You can’t sleep, you can’t walk around properly, you can’t always do the things you want to do that you are used to doing and some of your hobbies [……] finding ways and means round things with a chronic wound, it really makes you think. And how to, how to cope.

Kathleen
Minuteful for Wound User

What is the solution you have developed and how can it help with the problem?

Minuteful for Wound is a CE-certified specialist digital wound management solution for clinical use. The solution comprises three elements, a smartphone app, a web-based portal and a clinical data dashboard. Minuteful for Wound digitally enables the transformation of wound care through:

• Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered 3D wound measurements – Wound size is an indicator of healing progression, Minuteful for Wound makes it easy for clinicians to consistently capture wound measurements. The AI wound measurements are used to flag wounds that are deteriorating or not healing as expected enabling early visibility and intervention.
• AI-powered tissue type detection – Wound bed tissue types are often not consistently recorded due to time pressures, Minuteful for Wound auto detects three different tissue types saving clinical time and creating consistency in documentation.
• Best practice assessment flows – Minuteful for Wound has inbuilt standardised wound assessment templates aligned to best practice supporting standardisation and quality of assessment and documentation.
• Portal – Minuteful for Wound has a central web-based portal that enables virtual oversight of the entire caseload from any location. Senior and specialist clinicians can review patient wounds virtually enabling them to provide expert advice and guidance on treatment optimisation that is visible to all users of the solution in the app and shared treatment plan.
• Clinical data dashboard – Data is visible in an interactive dashboard enabling clinicians to proactively audit their caseload to meet clinical quality indicators.
• Patient app – Clinicians can onboard patients to our new patient app enabling patients to scan their wounds at home for remote monitoring reducing the burden of visits for clinicians and patients.

A picture paints a thousand words and I found it much more effective to be able to assess wounds based on the photographs and information readily available on the system than having to remove dressings, speak to nurses and read the short entries made in the hand written notes by overstretched nurses.

Unequivocally I found this system improved patient care. The reduced time spent assessing wounds, allowed me to assess wounds and provide feedback effectively to the nursing team and provided an excellent record of healing.

Consultant Surgeon

What have you achieved while on the DigitalHealth.London Accelerator?

We have seen 700,000 assessments completed with 150,000 wounds managed, which means thousands of patients and clinicians have been able to improve patient care with the support of Minuteful for Wound. Our partner organisations have also demonstrated significant improvements in workforce productivity, quality and patient safety; including in-year cost savings.

Some examples are:

• 50% reduction in the time taken to complete documentation
• 230% increase in patients being reviewed by senior nurses without an increase in resources
• 66% reduction in unnecessary visits by senior nurses allowing them to prioritise the patients that need them most
• 64% reduction in wound care serious incidents

We achieved CE accreditation for our Minuteful for Wound @ Home solution, which expands our solution to allow patients to scan their wounds from the comfort of their own homes while still being supported by a clinician remotely. With this new addition, we hope to enable supported self-care by increasing patient engagement and motivation with live visual progression of wound healing. This arrangement benefits both the patient and their family, as well as the clinicians who are monitoring their health – improving their clinical insight.

Recently published evidence by Hallas (2021) suggests that implementing a self-care delivery model can release:

• 23 hours per patient per healing trajectory
• A cost reduction from circa £1500 to circa £190 per patient

This is just the beginning and we believe taking a whole system view of wound care delivery offers a huge opportunity for transformation of care and the ability to impact the £10 billion spent. The DigitalHealth.London team has also helped facilitate joined-up thinking in wound care by holding round table events such as The Importance of Evidence-based Data in Supporting Services for Wound Care and the Potential for Innovation in December 2023, which we were grateful to be a part of.

Where have you had the best adoption/spread/impact?

Our partnerships across the UK have seen remarkable success with many sites committing to long-term digital wound management programmes, but it’s our partnership with Bromley Healthcare CIC that has seen a significant impact over our time with the DigitalHealth.London Accelerator. London has a unique socio-economic landscape, and with the proactive engagement of the community team in Bromley as part of the National Wound Care Strategy Programme (NWCSP) Test and Evaluate Programme, they have had great success in transforming their wound care service.

• Adoption: The first pilot phase of our programme involved the Beckenham and Penge district nursing and podiatry team, which was small, but embraced with great enthusiasm. This can be attributed to several factors, including the presence of forward-thinking clinical leadership from Mehmet Hussain, Gill Harman and Sandra Firth. Coupled with the comprehensive training sessions and workshops offered by our Partnerships team and continuous project update communication to the organisation, a successful adoption programme was completed.

• Spread: The spread of the initiative within Bromley Healthcare CIC has been facilitated by partnerships from DigitalHealth.London, Health Innovation Network (HIN) South London, NWCSP and local NHS organisations. The Bromley project team committed to working collaboratively with us throughout their early stages of deployment to evidence impact. Collectively, we were able to evidence the impact of the program on the specific needs of the local patient population. As a result, the initiative expanded beyond its initial areas, covering their entire community nursing and podiatry team.

• Impact: The impact of the digital wound management programme in Bromley Healthcare CIC has been exceptional. Outcomes include improved quality of documentation, an increase in workforce efficiency, and a reduction in unnecessary travel and enhanced care for patients. Additionally, the success of the project was recently recognised by the SETHA 2024 Business Awards for Advances in Digital Technology and has served as a model for replication in other areas, demonstrating the often challenging scalability and sustainability of digital programmes in the NHS.

“I cannot begin to describe the time saved utilising Minuteful for Wound for senior reviews. Staff are able to escalate their concerns, have a senior clinician review the wound photograph and wound history alongside dressings applied and give feedback and advice without the delays of waiting for a home visit. This improves the distribution of skill mix within the team and releases time to care”

District Nurse

We are so pleased to be able to support the Bromley team, and look forward to the next steps that hopefully involve connecting their primary care services into the programme.

How have you made the most of your time on the DigitalHealth.London Accelerator?

As a small organisation, committing the necessary time to the Accelerator was challenging, given our limited resources. However, we firmly believed in the value of the programme and recognised the importance of prioritising it amidst other pressures and deadlines – all easier said than done.

Our first step was to review the educational workshop schedule and identify the sessions that would be most beneficial for us (nearly all of them). We assigned team members to attend and report back their learnings.

Secondly, making the most of the opportunities at the Networking Days. These events were great opportunities to gain valuable insight into the latest priorities of Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) and Trusts across London, as well as to meet with peers for shared learning opportunities.

Ultimately, the Accelerator has been instrumental in many ways, but in particular:

• Providing us access to expertise in different healthcare settings to enhance our knowledge in delivering connected care that is impactful for clinicians and patients
• Networking opportunities to create new partnerships and collaborations but also to understand the healthcare ecosystem of London further
• Wide-ranging educational programmes to support our organisation’s learning and development
• Creating market awareness of our solution from social media, conferences and pitching opportunities amongst many others

“We are delighted to have had the incredible opportunity to participate in the Digital Health London Accelerator programme. The programme has provided networking opportunities to meet key stakeholders and understand their strategic needs.  Expert insights and resources were also invaluable and provided development opportunities for our wider team. The programme  has really helped us to refine and build on our value proposition and understand our market fit. Special thanks to our NHS Navigator who was very invested in our success. We felt we had an extended supportive team and highly recommend this programme to any innovative start ups!”

Thariea Whisker
Director of Minuteful for Wound Services UK at Healthy.io

The DigitalHealth.London Accelerator programme is funded by the UK Government via the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF). It is delivered by the Health Innovation Network (HIN) South London in partnership with the Office of Life Sciences, CW+, Medicity, NHS England, the Mayor of London and the Levelling Up Fund.

For more information, please visit https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-
shared-prosperity-fund-prospectus.