The Future of Healthcare Imagined…


Haelo, an “innovation and improvement centre” joint venture between Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust and the Salford Clinical Commissioning Group, have produced the abovevideo sharing views on how healthcare might evolve over the next 20 years through the ‘adoption of technology, patient owned data, patient-centred care and a focus on population health‘.

I’m not sure anyone in Healthcare should be trying to plan 20 years out as there are things that are inevitably going to happen within only 10 that are unthinkable to most of us today but here are a few thoughts I had on watching the video:

Dr Dimple Vyas Consultant Anaesthetist Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust

I can get my bank account details over the phone, over the internet, wherever I want to be, whenever I want it and I cannot get my healthcare information. I cannot contact my healthcare professional when I want to. I’m looking to see if I can own my own healthcare record. I’m looking to see if I can have an iPad visit with my Consultant” Dr Dimple Vyas, Consultant Anaesthetist Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust

This point of view really validates why I think the future of healthcare is going to be a mobile experience and why we’re more likely to drop the Health in mHealth than we are to drop the m. There is no doubt that eventually all healthcare services will be as comprehensively documented and accessible as Dr Vyas now expects them to be (if I’m wrong about this 3GDoctor is going to be a lot bigger than the NHS!). If you find this hard to appreciate try and imagine how you might be able to determine if the person sitting across from you on the train is listening to music on their smart earbuds or participating in a bio-interactive therapy session? Or how you might know if someone across from you is playing a game or sharing their health concerns and interacting with their family Doctor?

Sir David Dalton CEO Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust

I think what’s going to change the future of healthcare is Digital. (it’) about giving power to Patients so that they can own their own healthcare records and so that they can provide the information they know about themselves and to give that to the people they’re asking to care for them or treat them. So I think that transfer of power is going to be by far and away the biggest thing that we do” Sir David Dalton, CEO, Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust.

It amazes me that in 2014 we still have very senior people talking about the importance of “digital” (note: the companies making the most money and getting the most traction with new services no longer talk about the distinction between digital/non-digital as they have realised that being relevant to the consumer simply requires us to think about how customers use their mobile device) in the future of their organisations but they still hold an unwavering trust that concepts like ownership will suffice. Surely by 2014 every Professional involved with leading change in the NHS has used CTRL+C CTRL+V or backed up a hard drive and can see that the idea of talking about a digital file as though it’s a physical piece of property is unworkable?

Related: Join us on Monday 21st April 2014 at Imperial College London for Imagine the Future of Medicine.

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