Improving Wound Care with Healthy.io: Insights from the Beckenham District Nursing Team

In this case study, Sandra Firth, Neighbourhood Clinical Team Manager at Beckenham and Penge District Nursing, shares how DigitalHealth.London Accelerator company Healthy.io’s wound management app Minuteful for Wound has helped the Beckenham District Nursing Team improve wound care for their patients. The primary benefits observed include enhanced accuracy of wound data and improved efficiency in wound management.

Overview

Healthy.io’s Minuteful for Wound is a digital wound management solution consisting of a smartphone app, caseload management portal and BI dashboard. The solution is DTAC compliant, CE accredited and uses innovative AI and machine learning to provide consistent measurement and assessment data to drive wound insights, helping clinicians dynamically monitor their wound caseload. 

The Beckenham District Nursing Team initiated a project to trial the app, assigning staff to download and utilise it for wound photography.

Project Objectives

The project was initiated with the primary goal of enhancing the accuracy of wound data and facilitating staff to monitor wound progress over extended periods. While one team promptly adopted the usage of the app from the outset of the project, it took several months before other teams followed suit.

The process of assessing wound status has been streamlined, enabling quick identification of any deterioration or stagnant healing, prompting timely intervention by senior nursing staff. The app’s accessibility ensures that wound data is easily retrievable, leading to significant time savings during patient reviews for senior staff.

Notably, patient engagement remained high, with their active interest in the project, despite no alterations to the photographing process in terms of time or procedure. This seamless integration of technology has resulted in improved efficiency in wound management, ultimately enhancing the quality of patient care.

“I love it [the app] now; I can see the progress a wound is making easily, and it [the app] is easy to use.”

George
Registered Nurse

Impact/Outcomes

• Senior staff can conduct clinical reviews without visiting multiple patients
• Creation of new care plans after review, leading to reduced use of antimicrobials
• Ability to monitor wound progression by viewing all photos together
• The app clearly identifies deteriorating and static wounds
• Possibility for case finding and referral to specialist services for deteriorating or static wounds.

The project successfully achieved its initial objectives, and we are now experiencing additional benefits with enhanced senior review and oversight of wounds within our caseloads.

Next Steps

Following the trial’s success, app licenses were expanded to include the Beckenham District Nursing Team’s regular agency staff. After 12 months, we believe we are just starting to tap into the app’s potential benefits, as senior staff members begin to fully explore its advantages.

We plan to extend the rollout to other district nursing neighbourhoods as well as organising regular meetings with Tissue Viability Nurses (TVN) within each team to identify and review more complex wounds.

Find out more about Healthy.io and Minuteful for Wound.

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.