Pharma giant Novartis Pharmaceuticals UK and UK provider of digital healthcare solutions, Cievert has announced a digital innovation partnership.

The collaboration will support patient care in rheumatology and dermatology by capturing patient-reported data.

The partnership was created via the Novartis BIOME, a project which encourages impactful collaboration in science tech, with a selection procedure involving NHS clinicians and innovation leads.

Novartis and Cievert are working closely with the NHS to launch pilot programmes at various sites across the UK.

WHY IT MATTERS

The platform enables patient-reported outcomes and disease activity measures to be fed into the system, giving patients the opportunity to be more involved in their care. Through this, patients are encouraged to report symptoms and progress from home, which can be remotely reviewed by clinical teams. 

The digital platform aims to support patients, healthcare professionals and the NHS in three areas:

• Capturing patient digital health records in one single platform, which could reduce misalignment among healthcare teams, saving clinicians valuable time going between multiple systems and ultimately resulting in more timely management of care.

• Helping coordinate and prioritise appointments based on patient need rather than routinely scheduled reviews, which could help reduce waiting lists and hospital visits.

• Collecting real-time patient data in the community and helping patients to take more control over their health and care.

THE LARGER CONTEXT

Several major NHS leadership shifts have been recently announced as both NHS England and Improvement (NHSE/I) and NHS Digital are preparing for a change as the health service seeks to usher in the new era of healthcare innovation post-pandemic.

In related news, an initial investment of €24 million has been made by Sanofi, Capgemini, Generali and Orange to create a platform that accelerates the development of digital healthcare solutions in Europe. The project aims to bring together scientific and technological expertise across the region and will be operational from June 2021.

ON THE RECORD

Dr Sandeep Bawa, consultant rheumatologist, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde said: “In the current climate, the remote management of chronic disease is regularly navigated without supporting information from the patient regarding their condition. This creates a gap in our ability to understand the full picture of disease activity and progression in the outpatient setting.

“A remote monitoring solution that allows us to assess a patient’s disease activity in the community will allow us to manage a patient’s care more effectively, by identifying those in need of early clinical review from those who may require less frequent review. Now more than ever, digital tools have the potential to transform care for our patients and help streamline processes in the NHS by supporting the transition to a needs-based model of care, whilst maintaining best practice.”

Chris Kennelly, Cievert CEO and former NHS Clinician, said: “In five years’ time we expect the existing clinical model of care to look markedly different. There is a unique opportunity to accelerate digital reform of the NHS after COVID-19, which has marked a shift in digital and remote healthcare access. Our partnership with Novartis is a big step in the right direction and we are looking forward to bringing our digital-first solution to HCPs and patients in the UK.”