Following our Evidence into Practice call earlier this year, we are delighted to announce the successful evidence-based innovation that will now receive our support for rollout across the wider West of England.
From the 20 high-quality applications received, we have selected the outpatient hypertension pathway for women and birthing people at high risk of developing hypertension in pregnancy, developed by Great Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.
Hypertension (high blood pressure) during pregnancy affects around 8% to 10% of all pregnant women and can be associated with complications for both the woman and the baby.
Providing enhanced care to women at high risk of hypertension during pregnancy, this innovative service empowers them to keep healthy and well at home using an automated text messaging system.
As well as providing better care for women and their unborn babies, the pathway has been shown to offer welcome benefits for patients by reducing the financial cost and physical impact of travelling into hospital for frequent appointments.
The pathway also provides positive system benefits. Modelling of data from 2023 shows that every year the outpatient service at Great Western Hospitals saves 1,248 face-to-face appointments, 312 clinical hours and 118 acute unit appointments.
This is also good news for our Net Zero ambitions. Compared with a face-to-face model, the outpatient pathway reduces carbon emissions by over 22,000kg CO2e a year – the equivalent of four premium economy flights London to Hong Kong return.
Pete Carpenter, Director of Programmes at Health Innovation West of England, said: “We’re very excited to start working with the team at Great Western to enable more people across our patch to benefit from this approach.
“The outpatient hypertension pathway is an ideal candidate for wider adoption and spread across the West of England, as it has well tested clinical pathways, excellent patient-facing resources and a robust quality improvement delivery model for staff.”
Angela Willis, Midwife and Sustainability Clinical Fellow Alumni 2023/24 at Great Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, said: “We are thrilled that our outpatient hypertension pathway has been selected for adoption and spread across the West of England.
“We’ve had such positive feedback from women and birthing people and hospital staff in Swindon and Wiltshire, and can’t wait to see so many more people get the opportunity to benefit from this service. It genuinely puts the patient at the very heart of their care, while also reducing the impact on the environment and helping to make our systems more efficient. We think it’s win-win, and we’re so pleased Health Innovation West of England think it’s a winner too!”
This is the third Evidence into Practice call by Health Innovation West of England. Previous projects supported by the Evidence into Practice programme include the award-winning PReCePT, PERIPrem, SHarED and PreciSSIon.
Posted on September 10, 2024
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