On Friday 31 August, Professor Stephen Powis, National Medical Director at NHS England visited the West of England to hear about our work, past successes and future plans.
Stephen met with our senior team and some of our board members at Future Space at the University of the West of England (UWE).
The AHSN team kicked off the day by presenting some of our most successful projects to Stephen. This included our work on the National Early Warning Score (NEWS); PReCePT, the programme to prevent cerebral palsy in preterm infants and many of our initiatives around innovation and growth.
The group talked about horizon-scanning for new innovations and creating systems for sharing data across networks. This is a hot topic in healthcare innovation at the moment, especially given our work around One South West, a project to connect up all point of care records across the West of England and South West.
Stephen said he believes there is a need for front-line clinicians to get involved in spotting the gaps in services and identifying areas for improvement. He went on to talk about his passion for organisations that work collaboratively to put the patient first, and said he believes AHSNs are a crucial component of this collaboration.
Following the discussion, the group took a tour around Future Space to see the health tech labs and robotics centre, a collaboration between UWE and the University of Bristol.
Natasha Swinscoe, Managing Director of the West of England AHSN said: “We were delighted to welcome Stephen Powis to the West Country. The day was a brilliant opportunity to showcase our work and find out how we can collaborate with NHS England going forward. Many thanks to Stephen for visiting us.”
Posted on September 5, 2018
