Coinciding with National Self-Care Week, Eastern AHSN is hosting its “Innovation in healthcare: new solutions to well-known issues” event with over 60 NHS leaders from the NHS in the East of England.
Sharing her story as an activated patient recovering from a heart attack, Maggie will be speaking about her experience of the Active+ Cardiac Rehabilitation programme that provides physical exercise, education and training in the use of health monitors at home using Aseptika’s Activ8rlives’ technology, as an alternative to follow-ups at Outpatient clinics.
In a new report “Outpatients: The future - Adding value through sustainability” by the Royal College of Physicians (9th November 2018), which acknowledges the dedication and hard work of NHS staff, the traditional model of outpatient care is described as “placing unnecessary financial and time costs on patients, clinicians, the NHS and the public purse.”
With 127 million outpatient appointments last year in the UK (five times more than seen in Accident and Emergency) this report states that “with growing demand and expectations not being met … to deliver high-quality healthcare, we must start to think in terms of value and sustainability. The time has come to overhaul the system by embracing innovation: making more use of remote monitoring and telephone and video consultations … All the technology needed is already available.”
Maggie had a heart attack 5 years ago and has since participated in the technology-enabled Active+ programme in Huntingdon in collaboration with Huntingdonshire District Council and with support from Eastern AHSN.
"It has made me feel much more secure about my health, I can print out the data and take it to the next doctor’s appointment instead of having to remember how I’ve been feeling, it’s all there in black and white. I am sure that doing this programme will keep us all going for a lot longer. I hope that by looking at the charts, we won’t have to go back into hospital for Out Patient appointments.”
The Active+ programme improves patient activation measure (PAM) by 15% (9 Points), reducing the need for professional health services (including outpatient appointments) and predicts a 19% reduction in admissions to hospital.
All of this takes place in the setting of a leisure centre and not a hospital. The Active+ is a successful alternative to unnecessary repeat outpatient appointments, freeing NHS staff to undertake front-line activities and reduce waiting times for critical procedures.
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Notes to Editors
Active+ has been adapted for those with cardiac conditions and the same model of care is used, but the exercise techniques and monitoring activities have been carefully tailored to benefit people who have experienced cardiac issues. The programme can be adapted to support many other long-term condition (LTC) such as diabetes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), asthma and cancer and any other LTC.
The programme supports falls prevention (strength/balance), cardiac, cancer and pulmonary rehabilitation, and is replicable across multiple long-term conditions. There is strong evidence demonstrating that exercise can improve or maintain health for all forms of long-term conditions. For those diagnosed, once acute treatment by the NHS has ceased, participants have limited support until they become acutely unwell or frail and then the costs to the health and care system escalate.
Individuals are provided with the Activ8rlives’ simple-to-use, self-care monitoring devices to monitor physical activity, heart rate, blood pressure, weight and other vital signs. The data is transmitted to the Activ8rlives platform which enables people to review their health and supply this information to their care providers as required.
The Eastern AHSN has supported the relationship building between Aseptika Ltd, and Huntingdonshire District Council in a collaborative project using the Active+ programme to support cardiovascular and cancer rehabilitation initiatives.
For more information, please visit: www.activ8rlives.com
Activ8rlives, Activ8rlives.com, Asthma+me and PUFFClicker are trademarks of Aseptika Ltd.
For further details, please contact Jessica Auton on 01480 352821 or email jessica.auton@aseptika.com
About Aseptika Ltd
Aseptika Ltd began developing Activ8rlives in 2010 and is currently developing its fourth generation of integrated systems, which can be used by consumers and their healthcare service providers using a wide range of platforms or devices to better enable effective and easy self-monitoring. Incorporating sensors and monitors ranging from consumer accessories to in vitro diagnostics (IVDs). Our focus is: respiratory and cardiovascular disease, cancer, promoting physical activity and weight management.