The Isle of Wight NHS Trust NHS supports Island Care and Nursing Homes to protect vulnerable residents through implementing video consultation care across the Island and wins award for the ‘Best COVID-19 Remote Monitoring Solution’ at the 2020 Health Tech Digital Awards

All nursing and care homes on the Island are being given equipment and training to monitor key observations remotely and reduce the need for Health and Social care professionals to go into the care homes.

The monitoring kits, which combine tablet computers with a suite of devices that monitor blood pressure, temperature, pulse, respiration and blood oxygen levels, are an important step to enable more care to happen remotely, automatically alerting healthcare professionals to people who need their support and reducing the movement of residents and health professionals in and out of the homes.

The combination of the new devices and Attend Anywhere software will enable GPs, hospital doctors and other health professionals to have virtual consultations with patients, avoiding the need for face-to-face appointments.

Isle of Wight NHS Trust Telehealth Lead and former paramedic, Brian Martin said: “We have been introducing remote telehealth monitoring and working alongside a number of our local NHS services for some time now and the approach we have taken with technology has given us the opportunity to support care home staff and residents.
“Not only does the technology assist with the need for less face to face contact and movement of people in the community but it has also shown that through better monitoring we can be more informed about the improvement or deterioration of a person’s health and work with them to make more accurate and timely decisions about their healthcare needs.”

“Our clinical teams are able to now spot signs of early deterioration in a patient’s condition, so we can either provide them with advice there and then so they can start to self-manage or advise them to get further advice from their GP or community nurse. So not only is this a better experience for our patients it means they are getting the right care at the right time as well as reducing a potential avoidable hospital admission.”

Following the announcement of a national lockdown the team accelerated the rollout of both technologies to try and reduce the risk of transmission of COVID-19 to the most vulnerable Island residents. All nursing and care homes on the Island were given the Telehealth equipment and training to monitor patients remotely and take part in video calls and reduce the need for clinicians to visit in-person.

The ‘Best COVID-19 Remote Monitoring Solution’ 2020 Health Tech Digital Awards celebrates and recognises the rapid implementation of Telehealth remote monitoring and Attend Anywhere, video consultation software, across the Island. The teams have helped to support the continuation of care for the Island Community throughout the pandemic where people were unable to visit their GP or come into hospital due to the risk of contracting and spreading the virus.

The following video demonstrates the system in use and benefits for patients within the care home setting. https://youtu.be/QLg3EmoiCSM
(Please be aware this was recorded before Covid-19 restrictions came into place)