Our PreCiSSIon (Preventing Caesarean Birth Surgical Site Infection across a region) project has been shortlisted in the category of ‘Driving Change through Data and Analytics’ HSJ Digital Awards 2025 for our work with Cemplicity and the maternity units across the West of England to reduce the impact of surgical site infections (SSI) following caesarean birth.
This year marks a milestone for the HSJ Digital Awards, with a record-breaking 432 entries submitted. Of which, 205 projects have been shortlisted, each demonstrating remarkable ingenuity, passion, and transformative impact in digital health.
The HSJ Digital Awards shine a light on teams and organisations driving meaningful change through technology, improving patient outcomes, streamlining processes, and enhancing the overall quality of care. Being shortlisted is a testament to Health Innovation West of England’s unwavering commitment to innovation and excellence in digital healthcare.
Lesley Jordan, clinical lead for PreCiSSIon, said, “We are honoured to be shortlisted for this prestigious award. This recognition reflects the dedication of our team and their relentless pursuit of digital advancements that truly make a difference in patient care. We look forward to celebrating with our peers and being inspired by the outstanding innovations shaping the future of healthcare.”
Surgical site infection (SSI) accounts for 14.5% of hospital-acquired infections in the UK. The majority present in the community, therefore accurate rates can only be obtained post-discharge. The standard UK measure is patient-reported outcomes (PROM) using the validated Public Health England (PHE) questionnaire at 30 days. This usually involves contacting patients via paper questionnaire or telephone and is very labour intensive.
Caesarean birth is common, yet most hospitals do not know their SSI rates, because case numbers are high and capacity to perform post-discharge surveillance is limited. We aimed to implement SSI surveillance following caesarean birth in the West of England region using the PHE questionnaire delivered by e-PROMS, meaning the questionnaire is delivered by SMS or email at 30 days. The team collaborated with a company called Cemplicity to implement a digital solution gradually in the maternity units over three months. Cemplicity is used globally by healthcare institutions to capture, measure, and improve Patient Reported Experience (PREMs) and Outcome Measures (PROMs).
By automating the process, the project is reducing the administrative burden associated with paper and telephone surveys and removes human error from data collection. One hospital in the region measures SSI using telephone follow-up by an SSI surveillance team. Project leads used this as a comparator for financial assessment.
The project team also codesigned a patient information leaflet with mothers, as well as a simple video for wound care after the procedure. They also worked with Maternity and Neonatal Voices Partnerships to include ethnicity in the questionnaire’s questions, allowing us to assess whether we are successfully reaching all patient groups. The questionnaire includes free text, enabling us to hear the voices of mothers after discharge and gain valuable insight into our services. The system uses artificial intelligence (AI) technology to identify themes and areas for improvement.
Having established reliable SSI surveillance, the teams implemented an agreed standardised care bundle aiming to reduce infection rates. This has now been implemented in 5 trusts and has resulted in significant reduction in variation in SSI rates between units and a small reduction in the actual rates. The extensive data set of over 8000 mothers has resulted in a robust understanding of risk factors for SSI rate following caesarean birth, identifying factors that are significant and enabling specific interventions to minimise these risks. Ongoing SSI monitoring is essential to monitor the effect of these interventions.
The winner of the Driving Change through Data and Analytics award will be announced at the HSJ Digital Awards ceremony on 26 June 2025, a night dedicated to celebrating the brightest minds and most impactful projects in digital health.
You can read more about the PreCiSSIon project here.
Posted on March 20, 2025
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