The NHS Long Term Plan reinforced the ambition for digitally-enabled care to go mainstream across the NHS, with technology increasing efficiency, enabling service transformation and empowering citizens.
GP-founded small and medium enterprise, Tekihealth Solutions, had developed an innovative remote diagnostic solution which could enable this approach but needed support to identify where their solution could successfully digitise care pathways and to gather evidence of its success.
Arden & GEM’s digital transformation team worked with Tekihealth to develop their product, customer base and evidence base through a 12-month programme of project management, evaluation, and business and service delivery support, which has seen successful pilots take place in the West Midlands and West Yorkshire, with Teki-Hub now in use in 10 care settings.
The challenge
The NHS Long Term Plan reinforced the ambition for digitally-enabled care to go mainstream across the NHS, with technology increasing efficiency, enabling service transformation and empowering citizens.
Designing and delivering at-scale digital healthcare solutions often requires NHS experience and expertise. While small and medium enterprises (SMEs) may be at the forefront of innovation they often don’t have access to the networks, funding streams and expertise needed to prove the efficacy of their solutions leading to large-scale adoption.
This was the challenge for GP-founded Tekihealth Solutions, whose Teki-Hub product provides remote diagnostic capability to support online consultations. Tekihealth needed support to identify where their solution could successfully digitise care pathways and to gather evidence of its success.
Our approach
Arden & GEM’s digital transformation team has experience of bringing together partners from across the NHS, industry, academia and government to accelerate the use of healthcare technology. By securing access to innovation funding streams, the CSU was able to provide a broad range of support – over an initial 12 month period – to enable Tekihealth to develop their product, customer base and evidence base, at limited cost to the SME.
Business management
With a range of potential funding streams available from primary care transformation, care home support, COVID-19 response and innovation grants, Tekihealth needed support to better understand the funding landscape and to standardise funding bids.
Arden & GEM assigned a dedicated programme management lead with significant transformation experience and established professional networks within the West Midlands to help navigate this landscape and improve bidding efficiency. Specific funding was also secured to help develop core marketing activities including product campaigns to generate business development leads.
Project management
Arden & GEM has introduced weekly catch up meetings, client action logs, regular client reporting and quarterly progress reviews. By adopting a project management approach, Tekihealth is now better able to work in a multidisciplinary manner with clients throughout the onboarding, delivery and evaluation phases.
Independent evaluation
In order to independently verify the benefits of the Teki-Hub solution within care homes, Arden & GEM designed an evaluation methodology to bring together different stakeholder perspectives utilising surveys, interviews and data analysis.
Evaluations have taken place in Wolverhampton and Kirklees, with a further 18-home trial about to commence across the West Midlands. The evaluation reports have provided evidence of benefits as well as key recommendations and learning points for the SME.
Service delivery support
With experience of providing IT support to over 500 sites, Arden & GEM has also been able to provide a dedicated resource to help the Tekihealth team with onboarding, device training and a helpdesk facility.
This flexible provision gives Tekihealth additional capacity, when and where it is needed, to deliver the responsive level of customer service expected within the health tech sector.
The outcomes
The specialist support provided by Arden & GEM’s digital transformation team has enabled Tekihealth to significantly grow their NHS client base over the past 12 months.
The Teki-Hub remote diagnostic solution is now in use in 10 care homes with a clear business plan to develop in five further geographies while also expanding its scope to community teams, outpatients and at home patient monitoring.
Tekihealth has renewed the contract with Arden & GEM until March 2022 to support this targeted spread and increase in scale.
"As a practising GP, I understand first-hand the challenges in providing efficient and effective healthcare services within the community and the role that technology can play in meeting these challenges. The business and project management expertise provided by Arden & GEM has been critical in helping us demonstrate the benefits of our Teki-Hub remote diagnostics solution to patients, carers, clinicians and the wider health system.
The team have a meticulous approach to projects which has been appreciated by our growing number of clients while their experience of working with different stakeholders within the NHS means they understand how to design evaluations that uncover actionable learning and recommendations.
The circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic have shown what can be achieved through innovative healthcare technology and I look forward to the CSU’s continued support as we adapt our product for emerging settings and applications."
Dr Omobolaji Iji, Director and Co-founder at Tekihealth Solutions