Health Innovation West Midlands reflects on a bumper 2023
Throughout 2023, Health Innovation West Midlands (HIWM) has celebrated many key milestones – from being re-licensed by NHS England, to renaming, programme completions, awards successes, events and much more.
As the end of the year approaches, the HIWM team has picked out 12 of their highlights from 2023, sharing why it was truly a year to remember.
Digital Innovators Skills Programme
In January, students from the Digital Innovators Skills Programme joined an NHS England assurance meeting to share their initial ideas of how they plan to solve health and care challenges as part of the HIWM junior incubator scheme.
Students and employees presented an introduction to the Digital Innovators Skills Programme and discussed the benefits of the HIWM junior incubator scheme, including building confidence and work experience in industries in which they have an interest.
Students also had the chance to talk about the projects they were developing to tackle a range of industry challenges, one of which being health and social care at HIWM.
All Systems Ergo Podcast
In April, HIWM launched a new podcast, exploring the impact of human factors in key areas of healthcare.
The podcast, called All Systems Ergo, sees human factors specialists from around the world share their experiences of incorporating human factors into their field of work and the impact it has had to support patient outcomes and improve care.
Hosted by Fran Ives, the podcast has so far released seven episodes discussing topics including transportation, patient safety and product design, as well as personal stories of industry professionals’ inspiring career journeys.
With a total of nine guests and 796 downloads, the podcast was a great success and the team are preparing for the launch of series two – watch this space!
TedxNHS
Back in September, Anna Edwards, Innovation Project Manager at HIWM, spoke at TedxNHS about medicines and their impact on the environment.
Anna delved into how medicines are harming our planet, how we can reduce the environmental impacts of medicines, and the challenges being faced to achieve this.
As part of her work, Anna has developed the West Midlands Pharmacy Environmental Sustainability Network – a cross-sector group of pharmacy professionals from across the West Midlands who meet regularly to share best practice.
Relicense and rename
In October, the Health Innovation West Midlands (HIWM) updated its name to Health Innovation West Midlands (HIWM), further enhancing its position as a leader in the development and spread of innovation across the region’s health sector.
The name change followed the Government and NHS England’s decision to re-license England’s 15 Academic Health Science Networks for a further five years under the title Health Innovation Networks.
The new name reflects HIWM’s vision to transform local health and care through collaborative innovation.
Highly Commended at HSJ Awards
In November, HIWM’s project ‘West Midlands Managing Deterioration in Care Homes Safety Improvement Programme’ was highly commended in the ‘Provider Collaboration of the Year’ category at the 2023 Health Service Journal (HSJ) Awards.
The project worked with 1,679 care homes across the region to support the training, adoption and sustainability of deterioration management tools. It aimed to reduce deterioration-associated harm by improving the prevention, identification, escalation, and response to physical deterioration through better system coordination.
The project has been recognised as a national exemplar and HIWM is continuing to support NHS England by establishing a national change package in line with the deterioration framework.
Stakeholder Conference
On 28th November, representatives from across the health and care sector descended upon Birmingham to take part and learn from the transformational health innovations and projects that HIWM has spearheaded.
HIWM hosted its inaugural Stakeholder Conference at Conference Aston, where it showcased how it helps transform health and care through collaboration across academia, industry and healthcare.
Projects showcased at the event included Heart Failure, Managing Deterioration in Care Homes and Patient Safety Incident Response Framework (PSIRF).
One attendee commented: “The event provided an opportunity to learn about HIWM, the work it does and how it can help local provider organisations. The presentations on key workstreams within a specified time were really useful and my favourite thing about the day.”
Point of Care Ultrasound (POCUS)
This year, HIWM has been working on its POCUS programme, which aims to support nurses and increase understanding across the industry of how POCUS can transform unchallenged traditions in healthcare.
The team is currently completing a real-world evaluation with the haemophilia team at Birmingham Children’s Hospital, which treats paediatric patients who present with suspected joint bleeds. When a child with haemophilia has a confirmed joint or muscle bleed, it must be treated by replacing missing clotting factors as soon as possible. POCUS could aid the team in their decision making and reduce the burden on the Radiology Ultrasound Department.
Results of this evaluation will be revealed in 2024!
Fuse Incubator Programme
This year, HIWM made adjustments to its Fuse Incubator Programme, which is designed to provide support to social enterprise start-ups.
The programme spans three months, providing support to enable new and budding social enterprises to move from ideation through to incubator, through delivery of bespoke courses such as masterclasses and 1:1 mentoring.
After research highlighted that West Midlands social enterprises are less resilient than in other parts of the country, HIWM made adjustments to the programme which included:
- Piloting two smaller cohorts over the year
- Having a small grant available
- Opening up applications to anyone in the West Midlands
- Adopting a new hybrid model
Patient Safety Incident Response Framework (PSIRF)
Throughout the year, HIWM has been working on the PSIRF project, which aims to create the optimal conditions for encouraging patient safety improvement across health and integrated care systems.
Outcomes to date have included the delivery of workshops and facilitated sessions, and a four-part webinar series which has enabled healthcare staff to gain knowledge to cultivate a positive safety culture – ultimately making workplaces safer and more efficient.
Webinar sessions can be watched on the HIWM YouTube channel here.
Leading the Way Into 2024
2024 is set to be a strong year for HIWM and the team will be led by new Chief Officer, Tim Jones, who was appointed in November 2023.
Tim has over 17 years of NHS Executive Board level experience at University Hospital Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust. Here, he has held roles including Chief Operating Officer, Executive Director of Delivery, and Chief Innovation Officer. He is also the Acting Chair of the Central & South Genomics Service Alliance, a member of Birmingham Health Partners Executive Steering Group and a member of the West Midlands Health Technology Innovation Accelerator Executive Board.
Tim will be providing strategic leadership as HIWM pushes forward with its areas of focus, which include leading through convening, supporting the workforce of the future, delivering evidence-based interventions to improve health and wealth, and delivery at pace and scale.
HIWM’s priorities for 2024 will be aligned with regional need, specifically around transforming health outcomes through innovation, supporting sustainable transformational change, and contributing to the economic growth and improvement of wealth of the region.
2023 has been a great success for HIWM and the team looks forward to an exciting 2024 – with many more successes to come.
Throughout 2023, Health Innovation West Midlands (HIWM) has celebrated many key milestones – from being re-licensed by NHS England, to renaming, programme completions, awards successes, events and much more.
As the end of the year approaches, the HIWM team has picked out 12 of their highlights from 2023, sharing why it was truly a year to remember.
Digital Innovators Skills Programme
In January, students from the Digital Innovators Skills Programme joined an NHS England assurance meeting to share their initial ideas of how they plan to solve health and care challenges as part of the HIWM junior incubator scheme.
Students and employees presented an introduction to the Digital Innovators Skills Programme and discussed the benefits of the HIWM junior incubator scheme, including building confidence and work experience in industries in which they have an interest.
Students also had the chance to talk about the projects they were developing to tackle a range of industry challenges, one of which being health and social care at HIWM.
All Systems Ergo Podcast
In April, HIWM launched a new podcast, exploring the impact of human factors in key areas of healthcare.
The podcast, called All Systems Ergo, sees human factors specialists from around the world share their experiences of incorporating human factors into their field of work and the impact it has had to support patient outcomes and improve care.
Hosted by Fran Ives, the podcast has so far released seven episodes discussing topics including transportation, patient safety and product design, as well as personal stories of industry professionals’ inspiring career journeys.
With a total of nine guests and 796 downloads, the podcast was a great success and the team are preparing for the launch of series two – watch this space!
TedxNHS
Back in September, Anna Edwards, Innovation Project Manager at HIWM, spoke at TedxNHS about medicines and their impact on the environment.
Anna delved into how medicines are harming our planet, how we can reduce the environmental impacts of medicines, and the challenges being faced to achieve this.
As part of her work, Anna has developed the West Midlands Pharmacy Environmental Sustainability Network – a cross-sector group of pharmacy professionals from across the West Midlands who meet regularly to share best practice.
Relicense and rename
In October, the Health Innovation West Midlands (HIWM) updated its name to Health Innovation West Midlands (HIWM), further enhancing its position as a leader in the development and spread of innovation across the region’s health sector.
The name change followed the Government and NHS England’s decision to re-license England’s 15 Academic Health Science Networks for a further five years under the title Health Innovation Networks.
The new name reflects HIWM’s vision to transform local health and care through collaborative innovation.
Highly Commended at HSJ Awards
In November, HIWM’s project ‘West Midlands Managing Deterioration in Care Homes Safety Improvement Programme’ was highly commended in the ‘Provider Collaboration of the Year’ category at the 2023 Health Service Journal (HSJ) Awards.
The project worked with 1,679 care homes across the region to support the training, adoption and sustainability of deterioration management tools. It aimed to reduce deterioration-associated harm by improving the prevention, identification, escalation, and response to physical deterioration through better system coordination.
The project has been recognised as a national exemplar and HIWM is continuing to support NHS England by establishing a national change package in line with the deterioration framework.
Stakeholder Conference
On 28th November, representatives from across the health and care sector descended upon Birmingham to take part and learn from the transformational health innovations and projects that HIWM has spearheaded.
HIWM hosted its inaugural Stakeholder Conference at Conference Aston, where it showcased how it helps transform health and care through collaboration across academia, industry and healthcare.
Projects showcased at the event included Heart Failure, Managing Deterioration in Care Homes and Patient Safety Incident Response Framework (PSIRF).
One attendee commented: “The event provided an opportunity to learn about HIWM, the work it does and how it can help local provider organisations. The presentations on key workstreams within a specified time were really useful and my favourite thing about the day.”
Point of Care Ultrasound (POCUS)
This year, HIWM has been working on its POCUS programme, which aims to support nurses and increase understanding across the industry of how POCUS can transform unchallenged traditions in healthcare.
The team is currently completing a real-world evaluation with the haemophilia team at Birmingham Children’s Hospital, which treats paediatric patients who present with suspected joint bleeds. When a child with haemophilia has a confirmed joint or muscle bleed, it must be treated by replacing missing clotting factors as soon as possible. POCUS could aid the team in their decision making and reduce the burden on the Radiology Ultrasound Department.
Results of this evaluation will be revealed in 2024!
Fuse Incubator Programme
This year, HIWM made adjustments to its Fuse Incubator Programme, which is designed to provide support to social enterprise start-ups.
The programme spans three months, providing support to enable new and budding social enterprises to move from ideation through to incubator, through delivery of bespoke courses such as masterclasses and 1:1 mentoring.
After research highlighted that West Midlands social enterprises are less resilient than in other parts of the country, HIWM made adjustments to the programme which included:
- Piloting two smaller cohorts over the year
- Having a small grant available
- Opening up applications to anyone in the West Midlands
- Adopting a new hybrid model
Patient Safety Incident Response Framework (PSIRF)
Throughout the year, HIWM has been working on the PSIRF project, which aims to create the optimal conditions for encouraging patient safety improvement across health and integrated care systems.
Outcomes to date have included the delivery of workshops and facilitated sessions, and a four-part webinar series which has enabled healthcare staff to gain knowledge to cultivate a positive safety culture – ultimately making workplaces safer and more efficient.
Webinar sessions can be watched on the HIWM YouTube channel here.
Leading the Way Into 2024
2024 is set to be a strong year for HIWM and the team will be led by new Chief Officer, Tim Jones, who was appointed in November 2023.
Tim has over 17 years of NHS Executive Board level experience at University Hospital Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust. Here, he has held roles including Chief Operating Officer, Executive Director of Delivery, and Chief Innovation Officer. He is also the Acting Chair of the Central & South Genomics Service Alliance, a member of Birmingham Health Partners Executive Steering Group and a member of the West Midlands Health Technology Innovation Accelerator Executive Board.
Tim will be providing strategic leadership as HIWM pushes forward with its areas of focus, which include leading through convening, supporting the workforce of the future, delivering evidence-based interventions to improve health and wealth, and delivery at pace and scale.
HIWM’s priorities for 2024 will be aligned with regional need, specifically around transforming health outcomes through innovation, supporting sustainable transformational change, and contributing to the economic growth and improvement of wealth of the region.
2023 has been a great success for HIWM and the team looks forward to an exciting 2024 – with many more successes to come.