Dublin-based medtech provider S3 Connected Health have collaborated with senior respiratory consultants across Ireland to develop a new clinical support tool to combat COVID-19.

Responding to rising case numbers, the Assessment of COVID-19 Risk of Respiratory Deterioration (ACORRD) was deployed to Beaumont Hospital within 10 days of conception and has been approved by the Irish Health Service for roll-out across the country.

WHY IT MATTERS

ACORRD was pioneered by Professor Richard Costello, senior respiratory consultant at Beaumont Hospital, the hospital caring for the highest percentage of COVID-19 patients in Ireland.

“With the number of cases rapidly increasing, we urgently needed to find a solution which enabled our hospital teams to cope with this crisis by optimising and scaling acute respiratory care delivery for all affected patients,” Costello explained. “And with additional clinical staff being pulled in from other departments to boost our respiratory care teams, we also needed something to provide clinicians less experienced in this area with the critical knowledge and decision support to care for patients.”

The ACORRD app enables clinicians to triage COVID-19 patients swiftly according to a COVID Critical Care Index (CCCI), specifically engineered for the solution. This scale recommends further treatment options derived from patient vitals and their method of oxygen delivery. This is particularly useful for guiding non-respiratory clinicians to deliver the best care to COVID-19 patients.

Prolonged use of ACORRD over time supports continued, up-to-date learnings on the virus by monitoring its progress and also enables timely identification of patient deterioration.

The development of the CE-marked class I medical device was supported by the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) and the Royal College of Physicians in Ireland (RCPI) and, following a derogation by the Health Service Executive (HSE), is already being piloted on over 1,000 patients.

THE LARGER PICTURE

Although the Irish Prime Minister has already announced their plan for easing lockdown, Ireland is still seeing a significant increase in confirmed cases of COVID-19. To address the country’s over 22,000 confirmed cases, medtech services are stepping up to try and alleviate the pressure on acute services.

ON THE RECORD

Martin Curley, director of digital transformation and open innovation at HSE, said: “The development of ACORRD and the speed of collaboration on this project is testament to the team of clinicians and developers from RCSI, RCPI, and S3 Connected Health…this project is an exemplar for agile development.”

Jim O’Donoghue, president of S3 Connected Health, commented: “In normal service, creating ACORRD would take up to a year, from developing the concept through to deployment. […] Digital health solutions are becoming a vital part of today’s healthcare system, and the COVID-19 crisis underlines the importance of embracing digital solutions to improve patient outcomes and facilitate more efficient care.”

Costello continued: “The adoption we’ve seen from clinicians has been very encouraging; non-respiratory clinicians, in particular, are finding it a very valuable resource. We are also starting to see some interesting clinical data from ACORRD, which is helping us better understand the trajectory of the disease and help plan for future requirements; to have the insight into the progression of this uncharted disease is invaluable.”