Research team sweeps the board with intensive care innovations
March 2006
A team that includes researchers from the universities of Manchester and Hull has taken both first and second prizes in a nationwide innovation competition run by Microsoft.
Dr Paul Dark, a clinical lecturer in intensive care medicine based at Hope, mentored and supported students to develop innovative, software-based products to support intensive care. The students then entered their ideas into Microsoft’s Imagine Cup, which sets young technologists from around the globe on the world's toughest problems and this year is themed on improving health.
Paul said: “It is so rewarding to achieve this recognition for ideas which were initiated here, and to know that our winning entry will now be developed into a prototype with the support of Microsoft. This is a web-based diary for intensive care patients, who are invariably unconscious for a considerable time due to their condition or the nature of their treatment.
“The fact that they miss a significant chunk of their lives can have serious psychological repercussions, which can slow down their physical recovery. It’s already been shown that when family, friends and hospital staff keep a written diary of what’s been happening, both to the patient and in the wider world, it can help their psychological recovery, and our online approach allows people to add multimedia content to a virtual diary from anywhere at any time.”
The team will now go forward to the global final of the competition in Delhi in August, and the idea will also be trialled in the Intensive Care Unit at Hope.
The team is also eager to develop the idea which took second place in the competition with a commercial sponsor. “Obviously a major concern for hospital units is the spread of hospital-acquired infections, and there has been a concerted drive towards the adoption of routine hand-washing by staff to help combat them,” Paul explained. “Our idea is to introduce a Bluetooth-based ID tag that reminds staff to wash their hands upon entering and leaving a patient area, recording the event automatically in a digital log.”
