Creating a Culture of Innovation for Healthcare

1. Background
2. Speaker Profiles
3. Recommended Resources
4. Audio Links

Background

 



 

 

 

 

 

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This event is part of the Economic & Social Research Council (ESRC) Festival of Social Science 2012.

BioCentre invites you to an exciting seminar designed to stir your thinking about technology and your vision for healthcare in the future. How could a greater understanding of our cultural perception of the relationship between healthcare and technology help to shape future innovation? The event will help to identify the key triggers which allow for innovations to succeed.

Without doubt the NHS is facing an unprecedented time of change in terms of how it operates as a healthcare provider. Patient centred and outcomes focussed are now the new hallmarks of the government’s plans for NHS transformation as we witness the break up of the public’s love affair with the hospital and the move towards primary care. 

Against the backdrop of the current financial climate there is a pressing need for resurgence in innovation which provides solution to key problems with fewer resources.  Expensive high–tech solutions continue to develop that require specialised infrastructure and skills which are often only found in an urban hospital setting. This development is however out of step with the growing demand for more simple solutions that can be delivered in community settings (ref: Christensen, C. et al. 2009, The Innovators Prescription, McGraw–Hill, New York, NY.) Crucial to this is the question of values which will shape how government, business and science go about making strategic long term decisions. 

At the same time the rise of the internet, chat rooms, online shopping, Twitter, Facebook show that citizens are prepared to take ownership of their health and increasingly aware of options and applications for their healthcare implications. This provides a good basis upon which to develop effective solutions. New innovative paradigms will only work if the behaviours they promote resonate with the needy. 

So what do these developments tell us about the interrelationship between the individual, healthcare and technology? How is technology impacting upon our understanding of healthcare? How does our cultural perception of healthcare shape innovation? How can we champion and develop affordable solutions which bring together technology, innovation and values? Does technology allow/enable citizens to be involved in shaping healthcare?

We believe that being able to start to form some answers to these questions will help to plot a way forward in terms of innovation in healthcare and focus on identifying the key triggers which allow for innovations to succeed. It is our desire that this event will help to serve this purpose.

Crucial to this conversation is to include the perspectives of the patients, healthcare professionals, industry, policy makers and regulatory. With this in mind, our speakers will include:

• Prof David Napier, Professor of Medical Anthropology, University College London
• Prof Daniel Steenstra – Hybrid innovator, ex–clinician and academic. Royal Academy of Engineering Visiting Professor of Innovation, Cranfield University
• Mirella Marlow, Programme Director for Devices and Diagnostics for National Institute for Health & Clinical Excellence (NICE).
• Dr. Alison Prendiville, Deputy Director of C4D (Centre for Competitive Creative Design). An expert in service design and the patient’s perspective on healthcare innovation and delivery.
• Member of the House of Commons Health Select Committee (invited)

 

 

Speaker Profiles

Professor David Napier

Professor of Medical Anthropology, University College London

David Napier is Professor of Medical Anthropology at University College London, Director of the University’s Centre for Applied Global Citizenship, and lead on its new Science, Medicine, and Society initiative—a think tank devoted to the relationship between university research and public outreach in health and medicine.

His special areas of interest are in health–care delivery and human well–being, caring for ethnically diverse populations and creativity in scientific practice. He has also published on law and anthropology, and intellectual property and biodiversity, being the author of five books and numerous book chapters, articles, and editorials.

For his work with more than 100 charities and NGOs, the UK government and research councils awarded him the University’s first Beacon Fellowship in Public Engagement. Professor Napier is involved in a number of applied research projects examining creativity in scientific practice, and the application of new technologies to health–care delivery. He is an inventor of medical devices and, as time permits, a consultant on vulnerable populations in the aftermath of natural and human disasters, having worked for, among others, Merlin UK, the United Nations, and the International Organization for Migration.




Professor Daniel Steenstra

Royal Academy of Engineering Visiting Professor in Innovation, Cranfield University

Design and innovation expert, Professor Daniel Steenstra is the Royal Academy of Engineering Visiting Professor in Innovation, with a particular focus on medical and healthcare technology, at Cranfield University. With a degree in medicine and a background in design and innovation spanning a range of sectors, Professor Steenstra brings a wealth of experience to his role.  More recently, Professor Steenstra has specialised in medical technologies, developing a number of specialist tools and processes including the patented InterQB It® – a new framework for joined up thinking to enable individuals and teams to deal with complex interactions in a simple and engaging way.

Professor Steenstra is also a founder member of Innovations Factory Ltd, a private sector R&D organisation uniquely positioned at the Heart of England NHS Trust in Birmingham. This link provides direct access to NHS staff and facilities for development and validation.

At Cranfield, his particular focus is on developing the Open–Source Medical Innovation Initiative, an ambitious project that aims to shape the way the medical device sector introduces new innovations, by developing life saving medical devices faster and at cheaper costs.

 

Dr. Alison Prendiville

Deputy Director of C4D

Alison currently holds the position of Deputy Director of C4D www.centrefordesign.com; a multidisciplinary centre. It facilitates the convergence of the STEM subjects (Science, Technology, Engineering, Medicine) with design. C4D was listed by the Design Council and NESTA’s Multidisciplinary Design Network in 2010, as one of eight best practice case studies of multidisciplinary design collaboration.www.designcouncil.org.uk/publications/

On completing her Masters in Design Management from the Royal College of Art in 1991, Alison worked commercially with a number of design led companies, David Mellor Design and Artek before entering academia. Funded by Thorn Transit Systems International (now part of Cubic), her doctoral research, awarded in 2001, was interdisciplinary, linking engineering specification to design, service management theory and practice. In parallel with her PhD she was a researcher on the EU Framework IV Programme MIMIC (Modality, Inter–modality and Interchange) www.transport–research.info

Alison has extensive teaching experience at undergraduate and postgraduate level encompassing Service, Product and Strategic Design. She has supervised and examined PhDs in the following subject areas: Design for Services, Design Management, Public Sector Innovation, Design Process, Design and Sustainability, Design Theory and Practice and Social Software Agents.

For more details visit:www.alisonprendiville.com

 

Mirella Marlow

Programme Director – Devices and Diagnostic Systems, Centre for Health Technology Evaluation, National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE)

Mirella Marlow is responsible for NICE’s programmes that evaluate and develop guidance on medical devices, diagnostics and interventional procedures.  Mirella joined NICE in 2004 as an Associate Director on the Technology Appraisals Programme, having previously worked for 15 years as a commissioner in the NHS.  She went on to manage NICE’s Interventional Procedures Programme and established the Patient Safety Pilot Programme in collaboration with the NPSA. 

Mirella has an MBA and a Masters in Medical Ethics and Law from Keele University. Her interests in medical ethics include measuring cost–effectiveness of interventions to improve safety in healthcare, and incorporating ethical considerations into HTA.

 

Resources

ESRC Festival of Social Science 2012

A written report on the event will also be published.

Audio

Audio recordings of this Symposium can be downloaded here