Jonathan Evans
Director, Communications & Events, ABHI
The UK boasts an incredibly rich legacy when it comes to healthcare innovation. However, adoption takes far too long, making it costly. To accelerate healthtech adoption, innovation officers should be appointed.
From the discovery of DNA’s double helix to the invention of the first Intraocular lens, this quest for pushing the boundaries of what is possible is matched by a world-class academic and research community. Add into the mix our strong regulatory pedigree and the fact that, in the NHS, we have the world’s largest single-payer healthcare system; and, unsurprisingly, the UK is a destination market for many innovators.
Accelerating delivery with healthtech
However, it is estimated that it can take up to 15 years for a product to be successfully adopted by the NHS. Given the vast majority of companies within the industry are small and medium-sized, this is far too long and costly an endeavour to be commercially viable. In an industry that is engineering-based and characterised by rapid, often incremental product design and development, we need to do things differently to recognise the enormous value and potential that healthtech brings.
The response to the pandemic did demonstrate, however, that the NHS can be as agile and fleet-footed as any other healthcare system in the world. Now, we must not only build on the lessons learnt but also strive to overcome some of the more systemic challenges that remain.
Perhaps the biggest blocker to change
is that innovation is nobody’s job.
Officers overseeing healthech innovations
Perhaps the biggest blocker to change is that innovation is nobody’s job. NHS Trust Boards see regular metrics — on finance and performance, quality and safety and workforce — with Executive Directors responsible for these important areas. But, with few exceptions, nobody at Board-level holds the portfolio for innovation. This is why ABHI is calling on every NHS organisation to appoint a dedicated Chief Innovation Officer whose role will enable hospitals to deliver efficiencies while adopting life-changing healthtech.
As part of each hospital Board, Chief Innovation Officers can make a fundamental difference to the NHS, while ensuring maximum value to the taxpayer. Until this is actively built into a senior job description, it is unlikely to become business as usual. Through such positions, they can help sustain positive pandemic response innovation, help build an early diagnosis culture and fundamentally ensure that innovation is encouraged for the benefit of patients, the NHS and the wider UK economy.