A health technology firm, which has developed a platform allowing patients to share decisions with their clinicians for best outcomes, has secured a six-figure funding boost from Innovate UK.
The technology from Cardiff-based Concentric Health, as well as empowering patients to make decisions that are right for them - and digitising the paper process - is predicted to save health boards money through reduced medical negligence costs and avoiding unnecessary operations.
Founders of the business, based at Tramshed Tech, are Carmarthen-born surgeon Dafydd Loughran and NHS and academic surgeon Edward St John.
They have received a £350,000 investment from the UK's leading innovation agency, that will help the business scale up where it is currently expanding its software engineering and user experience teams.
Mr Loughran said: "We’re hoping to drive healthcare towards data-driven, shared decision-making.
"We want to support decision making around what matters to the individual, and use technology to deliver insights into what the outcomes are likely to be for that individual.
"This funding will allow us to scale up from a pilot at Imperial Healthcare NHS Trust across interested Welsh health boards and internationally.”
Prior to Concentric, Mr Loughran undertook an artificial intelligence fellowship at Babylon Health in London, and brings that expertise to the expanding health technology ecosystem in Wales.
Mr St John said: "As a clinician I’m excited to be delivering a world-leading evidence base to support patients.
Published evidence demonstrates that patients engaged in shared decisions often make less invasive decisions, leading to both better outcomes aligned with their priorities, and projected savings of up to £11.6bn a year across the NHS. For health boards, Concentric allows the consent process to go paperless, with an audit trail of the discussions held and decisions made.”
Innovate UK’s manager for Wales, Jon Wood, said: “I’m delighted that Innovate UK are supporting Concentric here in Wales. The open competition is very competitive, so this funding is a great endorsement for Concentric and its innovative approach to data-driven surgical decision making.”
