Collaborative Innovation Fund award winners

Six projects aimed at benefitting the health of people in Berkshire and beyond have been awarded a total of £285,000 thanks to a partnership between the University and Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust (RBFT).

The Collaborative Innovation Fund (CIF) invited applications in September 2023 from projects seeking to solve healthcare challenges in new ways.

We can now reveal the winning projects, with details of those awarded below.

They include work to support the NHS long-term workforce plan, create sleep solutions for children with autism, and connect big data to tackle health inequalities in our region.

Healthcare Innovation Partnership

Now in its seventh year, the CIF scheme is part of the Healthcare Innovation Partnership (HIP), which was formed in 2021 between the University of Reading and RBFT.

The HIP has the vision to improve healthcare by building an environment and culture that fosters excellence in education, research and innovation in a sustainable, supportive and inclusive community.

More than £1.7m has been awarded for collaborative research since 2018, leading to almost £8m in external grants and funding.

Professor Orla Kennedy, Strategic Partnership Director (Health) at the University of Reading, said: “We were delighted to receive 21 applications from a wide range of Schools and Departments at the University and hospital Trust.

“We were struck by how many applications were developed collaboratively by our colleagues across professional services, education and research.”

Dr Janet Lippett, Co-Chair of HIP and Chief Medical Officer, said: “We’re really proud of the high quality projects that our teams are collaborating on with our University of Reading partners. Not only will these projects provide opportunities for our staff to develop their skills, but they’ll help us to provide outstanding care for our patients.

“Through the Health Innovation Partnership, our joint research projects continue to help us improve and innovate healthcare services, providing huge benefits to our community.”

Funded projects

Improving Staff Retention at the RBFT: Econometric Data Analytics, Probabilistic Forecasting and Management Intelligence

(Team: Pete Sandham, People Directorate, RBFT and Shixuan Wang, Department of Economics, UoR)

The team seeks to reform the Trust’s approach to staff retention at the RBFT. They will research, test and deliver a solution that enables them to model and predict the likelihood of colleagues leaving the Trust in the future.

Through the project, the team aims to create interventions to support workforce retention.

Platelet Function and Thrombotic Events in End-stage Kidney Disease (The PLATE Study)

(Team: Jon Gibbins, School of Biological Sciences, UoR & Nitin Bhandary, University department of Renal Medicine, RBFT)

Patients requiring treatment with dialysis for end-stage kidney disease require surgical creation of vascular access, through which dialysis can be performed. These routes of access often clog up, due to unwanted blood clotting (thrombosis). Why this thrombosis happens and ways to prevent it have not been established.

The team aims to use a specific antibody which is involved in blood clotting and use this as a way of identifying at risk patients and developing a personalised medicine solution.

Mapping the Impact of Counselling and Pharmacological Sleep Interventions on Autistic Children and their Parents and Caregivers

(Team: Catherine Hagan, Dingley/Paediatrics, RBFT and Tessa Tavassoli, School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences, UoR)

Sleep difficulties are some of the commonest challenges that autistic children and their caregivers face, affecting up to 80% of autistic children. Sleep difficulties have a long-ranging negative impact on quality of life.

The project will measure the impact of different intervention types on sleep quality in children and caregivers, using questionnaire measures and wearable devices that measure physiological parameters related to sleep quality, alongside measuring mental wellbeing of parents and sensory reactivity differences in children.

The team hope that the project will contribute to the evidence base that can help allocate patients to the correct interventions.

Development and Validation of Two Novel Urology Patient Reported Outcome Measures: The Recurrent Urinary Tract Infection Symptom Scale Diary and Recurrent Urinary Tract Infection Symptom Scale (Proxy Completion)

(Team: Katherine Findlay ; School of Psychology & Clinical Language Sciences and Bob Yang, University Department of Urology, RBFT)

Living with recurrent urinary tract infection (rUTI), where infection occurs more than twice in six months or three times in twelve months, has significant negative physical, social, emotional and economic impacts.

The lack of validated patient self-report measures means that clinical insights from symptom variability are side-lined, and patient perspectives invalidated, limiting patient-centred care delivery.

In this project, the team aims to create and validate two questionnaire measures which can be used by patients and clinicians to quantitatively assess how rUTI symptoms present.

Feasibility and Acceptability of Wearable Technology To Identify Patients Living with Dementia Who Are At High Risk of Readmission to Hospital

(Team: Aubretia McColl, University Department of Elderly Care, RBFT and Arlene Astell, School of Psychology & Clinical Language Sciences, UoR)

After an acute admission to hospital, people living with dementia have a high risk of readmission, with rates as high as 35% reported within the subsequent 28 days of discharge.

Wearable technology, such as smart-watches and mobile phone applications, combined with virtual ward monitoring, have been shown to identify patients at risk of readmission, and additionally help patients reduce their risk of readmission for specific diseases.

However, people living with dementia have been excluded from these studies and consequently excluded from accessing these technologies.

In this project the team will assess the feasibility and acceptability for people living with dementia to use wearable technology for remote health monitoring, and use it to identify those at risk of readmission.

Connecting Care to Combat Health Inequalities Across Berkshire

(Team: Baz Eghosa, Informatics, RBFT and Carol Wagstaff, Research Dean for Agriculture, Food & Health, UoR)

Data analysis is an essential tool for healthcare, but the quality and availability of appropriate data limit its efficacy, particularly when it comes to tackling health inequalities.

Many people experiencing health inequalities do not engage with healthcare and are missing from the datasets used across primary and secondary care. Other types of data held by local authorities and third sector organisations can provide valuable indicators of areas likely to be experiencing health inequalities.

In this project, the team aims to integrate these data into the Connected Care database currently used by NHS Trusts across Berkshire to enable better targeted support and direction of services.

For more information about how you can get involved in the Health Innovation Partnership, contact Sohail Akhtar, the HIP facilitator by emailing HIP@reading.ac.uk.