I am delighted to announce that RMPD staff won 1st and 2nd prize in the Innovative Technologies category at the NHS Innovations at Work Awards ceremony held at The Sage, Gateshead on 12th April 2005. A further entry was Highly Commended in the Innovative Service Delivery category.
Bill Allan, who heads the Clinical Measurement Section in our Sunderland Unit, was awarded 1st prize of a trophy and a cheque for £2,500 for his development of the Sunderland Air Pressure Meter. This device, developed in collaboration with an ENT Surgeon and Speech Therapist, is intended for patients who have undergone laryngectomy. In this serious operation voice restoration is usually achieved by fitting a small prosthetic valve between the patient's trachea and oesophagus. The device developed by Bill measures the air pressure within the patient's trachea while they speak, thus giving valuable information to the Speech & Language Therapist and providing biofeedback to the patient. The pressure meter is licensed for manufacture to Canford Group plc, Washington, Tyne and Wear.
Further details on the Sunderland Air Pressure Meter are available in our Innovations section.
Second prize of a cheque for £1,500 went to Julian Minns of the Bioengineering Section at NGH, for his stick-on Hip Protector. In elderly patients there is a risk of fracturing the hip in a simple fall. This new stick-on device shunts forces from the area at risk, thereby reducing the likelihood of a fracture. In the UK the average cost of a hip fracture is estimated to be £12,300. With over 60,000 hip fractures per year, the total cost to the NHS is £728 million and it is hoped that this device will contribute substantially to reducing this economic and human cost.
Further details of the Hip Protector are available in our Innovations section.
Finally, Laurence Scott of our Gateshead Unit was highly commended for his development of an Electronic Portering Database. This entry was successful in winning one of the RMPD Technologist Prizes for 2004.
The event this evening was attended by a wide cross-section of NHS staff including Chief Executives and Trust Chairmen and has shown once again the excellent calibre of staff that we have in RMPD.
Professor Brian Diffey
Clinical Director
14th April 2005
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