Theme Leads: Professor the Lord Ara Darzi and Dr Ana Luísa Neves

The pandemic triggered rapid changes in how care is delivered and accessed. As part of an emergency response, the NHS has embraced the use of new technologies to support patients, including the use of virtual consultations when a face-to-face appointment was not possible - nor safe. While this can potentially benefit patients, it also comes with its own safety risks: missed diagnosis, data security threats, and potentially excluding from care those that do not want (or are not able to) use remote care. More broadly, alternative service delivery models involve changes on when, where, and how care is delivered.

Our work

In this theme, we evaluate what are the impacts of new ways of delivering care on patient safety. We will do so by covering two different aspects. First, we will use routinely collected healthcare data to better understand the impact of these new modes of care on patient safety. Secondly, we will design tools to empower both patients and staff towards a safer use of these models. Any healthcare transformation that does not become available to all individuals has the potential unintended consequence of entrenching existing inequities. Therefore, we will evaluate differences on use, usability, uptake, and impact between groups of patients, across the several projects. We will work with a diverse group of professional and public members to shape both the research projects and the development of the tools, to ensure they are truly co-designed.