National Recognition for Cornish Health-Tech SME
On 12 September 2018, five regional Digital Health Accelerators (DHA) launched across the country, with the aim of rapidly increasing the take-up of digital health products in the NHS. Ultramed was one of the 34 companies awarded a place on this prestigious year long programme.
Following the success of the Digital Health Accelerator in London the programme has been rolled out across 4 other regions in the UK. After a highly competitive selection process Ultramed is one of only five companies chosen to represent the South West.
Working with high potential start-ups and SMEs each year, the programme, supported by the AHSN network, NHS England and NHS Digital, works alongside the companies to springboard the adoption of the innovative digital solutions into the NHS.
‘Ultramed are delighted to have been awarded a place on the Digital Health Accelerator, it is fantastic to get recognition at this level, the future is looking bright’ – Dr Paul Upton, Ultramed Co-founder and CEO.
Ultramed, an award-winning company, puts innovation and first-class patient experiences at the forefront of their strategy. The company have developed MyPreOp®, a cloud-hosted program in the Ultraprep® suite of six integrated products. There are 10 million procedures performed in the NHS each year and pre-procedure assessments are generally paper based which are inefficient and do not align with the NHS Paperless 2020 initiative. A Department of Health study predicted £65M p.a. savings if electronic preoperative assessments were used, this is so far not being achieved. MyPreOp® enables patients to enter, own and share their preoperative assessment information, from any device, at any time. This can be a one-stop preoperative assessment following a surgical outpatient appointment or completed from home. The patient shares their information with the healthcare provider, which generates a report for review by a registered nurse, the output can be integrated directly into the hospital EPR using HL7 messaging and SNOMED-CT coded data. MyPreOp® is powered by complex algorithms which underpin the future development of a Personal Health Record. Sophisticated clinical decision support suggests which preoperative tests and actions should be considered by the preoperative assessment nurse. Over 4000 patients have successfully used MyPreOp® in commercial trials in the NHS. MyPreOp® empowers patients, improves quality and efficiency, and saves nursing time and money.
The South West is an exciting region to be based with a network of support for health tech innovation. Ultramed have benefited from the increasing support over the last couple of years with programmes such as EPIC and the Acceleration Through Innovation initiative. Ultramed was initially funded by the co-founders, followed by angel investors and a highly successful Crowdcube fund raise in 2017. The target was reached on day 3 and went on to overfund by 300%. The initial grant funding helped with establishing the legal structure of the company including obtaining trademarks and design registrations to protect the Intellectual Property of the program and development work. The more recent grants have supported the innovative development of the software, carried out by Buzz Interactive, another award-winning company based in Cornwall.
‘Aligning investment funding with the grant funds that are available in Cornwall makes it a highly attractive county in which to set up a health tech business.’ Dr Paul Upton, Ultramed Co-founder and CEO
MyPreOp has recently been awarded the ‘Software of the Year 2018’ award at the South West Digital Awards where Buzz Interactive took home the title for the Ultramed program. This further supports the innovation and the work which has underpinned the development of such a comprehensive program.
The Digital Health Accelerator programme will be supporting Ultramed until September 2019, watch this space.
