qa-knowledgehub-mymhealth-com-e5c9u5w6p-v1

You said... We listened!

Mon, 19 Jan 2026 16:02:57 GMT

We want to make sure our product is designed with your needs in mind. To achieve this, we regularly send out surveys and work closely with our Patient & Public Involvement (PPI) group, ensuring that your feedback directly shapes improvements and updates.

A randomised controlled feasibility trial of E-health application supported care vs usual care after exacerbation of COPD: The RESCUE Trial

Mon, 19 Jan 2026 15:14:08 GMT

You can read the full publication here

Digital Pulmonary Rehabilitation: What We Learned from the TROOPER Study

Tue, 06 Jan 2026 16:52:54 GMT

You can read the full publication here

myCOPD Recognised in NICE Early Value Assessments for Self Management and Pulmonary Rehabilitation

Wed, 17 Sep 2025 14:30:17 GMT

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has formally recognised myCOPD within two published Early Value Assessments (EVAs) HTE18 and HTE19, providing a green light for conditional NHS commissioning of the platform during structured evidence generation.

NICE has recommended myCOPD for NHS use until December 2027 while further evidence is generated.

This dual recognition positions myCOPD as a front running digital solution for both pulmonary rehabilitation and long term self management of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), addressing two of the most pressing unmet needs in respiratory care.

A Step Forward for Digital Respiratory Care

In HTE18 , NICE identified a need for broader access to pulmonary rehabilitation, particularly for patients unable to attend face to face sessions. myCOPD’s digital PR capabilities allow patients to engage with evidence based programmes remotely, helping to improve exercise tolerance and reduce exacerbations.

Meanwhile, HTE19 recognises myCOPD’s wider role in self management, including symptom tracking, personalised education, medication support, and patient clinician communication. The guidance cited the potential for these tools to reduce hospital admissions and improve patient engagement.

Both EVAs highlight areas where more data are needed, particularly around long term outcomes, patient adherence, and NHS implementation costs, but acknowledge the growing role digital technologies play in addressing critical pressures across the health service.

“We are delighted that myCOPD has been recognised through NICE’s Early Value Assessment. It is testament to the rich evidence base for its value to health services and a major step in bringing trusted digital support to people with COPD across the NHS.” Prof. Tom Wilkinson, Chairman, my mhealth.

What This Means for the NHS
With COPD accounting for around 1 in 8 emergency hospital admissions in the UK, digital tools like myCOPD could help bridge gaps in access, personalise care, and reduce long term system burden. NICE’s conditional support ensures that while full routine commissioning awaits further evidence, patients and clinicians can begin benefitting from these technologies today.

About myCOPD
myCOPD is a comprehensive digital health platform that supports people with COPD in managing their condition at home. It is designed by NHS clinicians and includes tools for symptom monitoring, inhaler technique training, digital Pulmonary Rehabilitation, and more.

To find out more about the my mhealth platform and how this could support your area of practice, please get in touch.

Qismet accreditation renewal until 2028

Wed, 10 Sep 2025 14:53:00 GMT

myDiabetes secures Qismet accreditation renewal until 2028

myDiabetes has successfully renewed its Qismet accreditation for a further 3 years, reaffirming our commitment to delivering safe, effective and high-quality digital health support to people living with diabetes.

Qismet - Quality Institute for Self-Management Education and Training - is an independent, not for profit organisation in the UK that accredits self-management and structured education programmes. Qismet ensures that these programmes meet national standards and this renewal confirms that myDiabetes continues to meet rigorous standards of care, content and outcomes.

What Qismet accreditation means

Feedback from the Qismet assessment team says it all:

The following issues were identified as particular strengths with regards to the provision of myDiabetes

Improvement in the app and its delivery are continually sought and implemented - there is a clear philosophy and culture of improvement.
Staff enjoy working for the organisation and delivering the service; they are passionate about the concept of self-management and improving people’s knowledge and ability to self-manage.
There is excellent research data and evidence on the effectiveness of the programme: it is based on very sound principles.

There are over 43,000 myDiabetes users across the UK who are already benefiting from this resource, and we continue to work with our NHS partners to drive up access, so more can benefit.

Thank you to our users, clinical partners and the entire team behind myDiabetes for helping us achieve this milestone.

my mhealth and Patients Know Best Join Forces to Deliver Connected, Patient-Centred Digital Care

Wed, 10 Sep 2025 14:53:00 GMT

Empowering patients. Supporting clinicians.

A new partnership between leading digital health innovators, my mhealth and Patients Know Best (PKB) means shared NHS customers can streamline the delivery of their digital care tools, making it easier to empower patients to manage their health effectively.

The collaboration brings together my mhealth’s award-winning self-management platforms with PKB’s personal health record solution, which is already embedded within the NHS App.

“At the heart of this partnership is the patient,” said Dr. David Pettigrew, CEO of my mhealth .

“By aligning our platforms, we’re enabling people to take greater control of their health while supporting clinicians with joined-up, efficient care pathways. It’s a significant step towards the NHS’s vision of a single ‘front door’ for digital health.”

Key Benefits for Patients and the NHS:

● One seamless journey: Patients and clinicians benefit from a more unified experience across apps and services.

● Better outcomes through joined-up care: Shared access to data empowers more personalised and timely interventions.

● Greater access to services: Patients can engage with support tools and resources anytime, anywhere.

● Reduced clinical workload: Digitally enhanced care pathways streamline processes and free up clinical time.

● Scalable long-term condition support: Proven tools for managing COPD, asthma, diabetes, and more, integrated with national systems.

● Patient empowerment: Enabling people to be active participants in their health journey.

This partnership also honours the early vision of digital health pioneer Dr Warner Slack, who said in the 1970s:

“I hoped that the computer would help the doctor in the care of the patient. And in the back of my mind was the idea that the computer might actually help patients to help themselves with their medical problems.”

Today , that vision is becoming reality - placing digital tools directly in the hands of patients and enabling a more connected, compassionate, and sustainable NHS.

About my mhealth

my mhealth provides evidence-based digital therapeutics for patients with long-term conditions including COPD, asthma, diabetes, and heart disease. Trusted by NHS organisations across the UK, their platforms deliver scalable self-management support and remote monitoring tools that improve outcomes and reduce healthcare burden.

About Patients Know Best

Patients Know Best is the World’s largest Personal Health Record (PHR) and patient engagement platform, integrating data feeds from over 550 health organisations and providers. The system connects information from GPs, hospitals, social and mental health care providers, to create a single, unified copy of patient data. Everything from appointments and letters to test results, care plans, real-time monitoring data and discharge summaries, as well as the patient’s own data, are all available in one patient record, enabling patients and healthcare professionals to access up-to-date health information anytime, anywhere. In the UK, the platform serves over 5 million patients, registering 100,000+ patients and releasing over 20 million test results a month. PKB integrates with the NHS App to provide a single front door for patients to access their information.

Leeds Community Healthcare

Tue, 01 Jul 2025 09:05:11 GMT

Cardiac rehabilitation is undergoing an evolution as health care systems embrace digitally enhanced programmes that promise to support patient and service outcomes.

Cardiac rehabilitation (CR), a NICE recommended cornerstone in cardiovascular disease recovery and secondary prevention, has traditionally relied on in person sessions. However, there are often challenges to uptake and completion which can affect the number of people who successfully undertake and complete a programme. Digitally enhanced cardiac rehabilitation (DECR) is a modern approach that blends traditional care with digital delivery to move towards a menu-based approach to care.

Leeds Community Health Care CR team were one of the early adopters of this approach, introducing the myHeart app into their pathways in 2020.

‘we started using the app as our face-to-face classes had stopped during COVID and this gave us the option for patient to access an exercise programme and cardiac information digitally. We have since restarted our face-to-face programmes, but we still offer the app as an option for our patients. It gives us wider complimentary range for our patients.’ N. Simpson - CR lead

5 years on and the team have excelled in their use of the app and have just reached the huge milestone of over 1000 patients now registered on myHeart.

The way the team have utilised the app in their pathway has seen high levels of patient engagement with 84% of patients activating their account, competing over 9000 education sessions and over 12,800 activity diary entries.

A recent patient survey showed the impact this is having on the patients:

92% rated the app as good or very good
85% found the apps easy to use
88% would recommend the app to others
77% said the apps have helped them to learn more about their condition
81% felt more confident in managing their condition since using the app
85% felt there has been an improvement in symptom control since using the app
81% intend to continue using the app.

‘the digital app gives our patients the choice of what they want their Cardiac Rehab to consist of and helps us make individualised programmes for our patients’ N. Simpson - CR lead

Health services across the UK are working to leverage digital tools to support and enhance service delivery. Digitally enhanced cardiac rehabilitation offers services the chance to redefine recovery – offering more flexible, accessible care.

For more information on this article or other my mhealth projects, please get in touch https://mymhealth.com/contact-us

Empowering patients living with Severe Asthma: How severe asthma services are digitally transforming patient care

Tue, 01 Jul 2025 09:05:03 GMT

Empowering patients living with Severe Asthma: How severe asthma services are digitally transforming patient care.

Living with severe asthma can be overwhelming. Frequent flare-ups, emergency health care visits and the burden of managing complex medication can take a toll – not just physically, but emotionally and mentally. Severe asthma services across the UK are working to address these challenges through the introduction of the myAsthma+ app, designed specifically to support patients with severe asthma in managing their condition more effectively and confidently.

myAsthma+ combines high quality digital tools with clinical expertise to offer a range of tailored resources to support patient empowerment and improve self-management. Studies have shown that effective self-management can lead to reduced flare ups, improved quality of life and reduced unplanned health care demand (1). myAsthma+ puts evidence-based strategies into action, offering structured, easy to use tools that help patients take an active role in their care.

Key features of myAsthma+ are:

• Tailored education to improve health literacy

• Self-management tools to track symptoms and support timely response to changes

• A comprehensive series of mindfulness resources to aid stress reduction and anxiety management

• Validated assessment tools to help patients and their clinicians in the management of their condition

• And much more….

Over 3,300 patients have now been registered onto myAsthma+ across the UK. A recent patient survey* found that:

• 84% found the app easy to use

• 72% felt they had a greater understanding about their condition since using the app

• 69% felt more confident in managing their condition

With severe asthma affecting and estimated 200,000people across the UK, tools like myAsthma+ represent a much-needed shift toward proactive, patient-centred care.

UK Severe Asthma Services are leading the charge and are also using myAsthma+ to support clinical efficiencies, click here to find out how.

https://www.bmj.com/content/370/bmj.m2521

*patient survey conducted Jan 2025 – 42% response rate.

Innovate to Improve; Managing Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD)

Fri, 24 Jan 2025 15:09:30 GMT

North Bristol NHS Trust- poster presented at Southmead Hospital by the Digital Health Champions for my mhealth myCOPD app, as part of the PROPEL myCOPD study.

Permission to use received from Rebecca Fowler

View poster .

A real-world service evaluation of myHeart

Fri, 24 Jan 2025 15:01:55 GMT

Results of a service evaluation using myHeart in a large London-based acute NHS Trust.

We are pleased to report the outcomes from this recent service evaluation of myHeart and the potential benefit of using the myHeart app to supplement existing cardiac rehabilitation (CR).

Cardiac rehabilitation is an essential evidence-based intervention that supports patient recovery following a cardiac event. It offers patients a structured education and exercise programme to aid recovery and support behavioural changes to help reduce the risk of future cardiac health complications. The myHeart app provides a structure educational and exercise intervention that mirrors current CR service delivery as well as supportive self-management tools.

Overall, 721 patients were invited to participate in 1 of 4 groups (class-based CR, class-based CR with myHeart, home-based CR and home-based CR with myHeart). A total of 584 patients opted to use class-based CR and of these 43 chose to include myHeart to support them with this. There were 137 patients in the home-based group, with 54 choosing to include myHeart alongside their CR.

This 12-week evaluation involved functional, physical and psychological assessments both before and after CR to explore potential changes. Patients were also asked to complete a rating of perceived exertion Borg RPE scale (Borg 6-20). Those in the home-based groups were contacted mid-way through the study.

Results identified three key outcomes:

1. Blood pressure, cholesterol, LDL, BMI, HbA1c and exercise were all very similar across the groups with marginal differences across each measure.

2. Drop-out rates (DOR) of patients being invited to attend CR and attending CR were significantly lower in those groups with access to myHeart.

* Class only: DOR = 58.2% Class + App; DOR = 25.6%

* Home only: DOR = 73.5% Home + App; DOR = 42.6%

3. Those patients with access to myHeart and in the home-based group saw the greatest improvement in anxiety and depression scores.

This real-world evaluation provides an encouraging insight into the potential impact of myHeart to supplement CR services, and is suggestive that, as an adjunct to support both class and home-based programmes, myHeart helps to reduce drop-out rates in CR and can assist in reinforcing continuous engagement with CR programmes.

A real-world multi-centre service evaluation of myDiabetes.

Fri, 24 Jan 2025 14:17:51 GMT

A real-world multi-centre service evaluation of myDiabetes

Results have led to continued QISMET Accreditation for myDiabetes (QIS2015) and have revealed the app could play an important role in supporting structured patient education delivery for type 2 diabetes following initial diagnosis, and as an ongoing resource.

Together with a large Health and Care Partnership, we led a multi-centre service evaluation to explore the impact of myDiabetes on education course attendance rates. T2DM is a serious and growing problem worldwide and affects more than 3 million people in the UK. Structured education is a large part of managing T2DM to promote a healthy lifestyle and improve blood sugar control.

However, the uptake for education courses has been less than encouraging across the UK. By offering a digital alternative or adjunct to a class-based course those who are unable or prefer not to attend a class-based programme, are able to receive structured education. myDiabetes is an app to support patients and clinicians manage diabetes together, remotely and at scale.

Overall, 83 T2DM patients were recruited by the healthcare team, of which 28 chose to use myDiabetes alone, 35 chose only usual care, and 20 chose to use both. Patient education usage was monitored over a 12-week period. During this evaluation we monitored changes in diabetes related clinical health outcomes where possible, including HbA1c, blood pressure and body mass index. Participants in all three sites were asked to complete the Problem Areas In Diabetes (PAID) questionnaire at the beginning and end of the evaluation to explore markers of improvement in diabetes related distress.

Results showed the app was acceptable in this care setting with 31 of 42 patients using it alone or as an adjunct to usual care. A total of 586 education videos were watched, on average each patient watched 22.5 (SD 19.6) videos. There was a reduction in PAID scores across all arms, with the app only arm showing the greatest improvement. Patients using myDiabetes showed the greatest improvement in HbA1c (-7.5 vs –4.4 mmol/mol), Systolic Blood Pressure (-12.2 vs +3.3 mmHg) and PAID score (-6.8 vs –5.2).

In this real world evaluation myDiabetes performed better than published education course completion rates and resulted in significant improvements in HbA1c and PAID score compared to classed-based programs. This supports the use of myDiabetes to support the delivery of structured based education for patients with type 2 diabetes.

my mhealth Collaborates with NHS University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust to Enhance Asthma Care

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 14:49:38 GMT

NHS University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, part of North Central London ICB, is taking a significant step towards enhancing patient empowerment and optimising disease management.

Asthma is a chronic condition that affects millions of people worldwide, often leading to severe health complications if not managed properly. Recognising the critical need for effective self-management tools, NHS University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has chosen the myAsthma app to provide patients with the resources they need to take control of their health.

Dr Kay Roy PhD FRCP, Consultant Respiratory Physician University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, comments

“We are thrilled to introduce myAsthma as a self-management tool to our community. It represents a significant step forward in empowering our patients with asthma to take control of their health. By providing them with personalised support, we believe this tool will greatly improve their quality of life. Additionally, the use of myAsthma in outpatient settings will help triage patients more effectively, ensuring they are seen in a timely manner and appropriately referred for the right investigations and services. Our team is excited to see the positive impact this will have on the asthma population across North Central London ICB."

The myAsthma app, part of the my mhealth suite of digital health solutions, is designed to empower patients with comprehensive tools and information to manage their asthma more effectively. Key features include:

• Personalised Action Plans: Tailored asthma management plans based on individual patient needs.

• Inhaler technique training: Contributing to better health outcomes and reduced risk of exacerbations

• Medication Tracking: Reminders and logs to ensure patients take their medication as prescribed.

• Symptom tracking: Easy-to-use tools for tracking symptoms and triggers.

• Educational Resources: Access to a wealth of information on asthma, helping patients understand their condition and how to manage it.

As more NHS partners embrace the my mhealth platform, we're thrilled to witness its growing impact and the positive changes it is bringing to long-term condition care.

For more information on this article or other my mhealth projects, please get in touch https://mymhealth.com/contact-us

my mhealth data library

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 14:33:58 GMT

The my mhealth data library is an extensive resource designed to support healthcare providers by offering a wealth of information and tools related to COPD and long-term health conditions.

Innovate to Improve; Managing Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD).

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 14:09:28 GMT

North Bristol NHS Trust- poster presented at Southmead Hospital by the Digital Health Champions for my mhealth myCOPD app, as part of the PROPEL myCOPD study.

Permission to use received from Rebecca Fowler

View poster

Exacerbation predictive modelling using real-world data from the myCOPD app.

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 14:05:13 GMT

Evaluation MMH-E08 published in Published on Heliyon 13 May 2024

Henry M.G. Glyde1Alison M. Blythin2 Tom M.A. Wilkinson3Ian T. Nabney4 James W. Dodd5

EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Digital Health and Care, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK
my mHealth Limited, Bournemouth , UK
my mHealth and Clinical and Experimental Science, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK
School of Engineering Mathematics and Technology, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK
Academic Respiratory Unit, Translational Health Sciences, Bristol Medical School, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK

Abstract

Background

Acute exacerbations of COPD (AECOPD) are episodes of breathlessness, cough and sputum which are associated with the risk of hospitalisation, progressive lung function decline and death. They are often missed or diagnosed late . Accurate timely intervention can improve these poor outcomes. Digital tools can be used to capture symptoms and other clinical data in COPD. This study aims to apply machine learning to the largest available real-world digital dataset to identify AECOPD Prediction tool which could be used to support early intervention improve clinical outcomes.

Objective

To create and validate a machine learning predictive model that forecasts exacerbations of COPD 1-8 days in advance. The model is based on routine patient-entered data from myCOPD self-management app.

Method

Adaptations of the AdaBoost algorithm were employed as machine learning approaches. The dataset included 506 patients users between 2017-2021. 55,066 app records were available for stable COPD event labels and 1,263 records of AECOPD event labels. The data used for training the model included COPD assessment test (CAT) scores, symptom scores, smoking history, and previous exacerbation frequency. All exacerbation records used in the model were confined to the 1-8 days preceding a self-reported exacerbation event.

Results

TheEasyEnsemble Classifier resulted in a Sensitivity of 67.0% and a Specificity of 65% with a positive predictive value (PPV) of 5.0% and a negative predictive value (NPV) of 98.9%. An AdaBoost model with a cost-sensitive decision tree resulted in a a Sensitivity of 35.0% and a Specificity of 89.0% with a PPV of 7.08% and NPV of 98.3%.

Conclusion

This preliminary analysis demonstrates that machine learning approaches to real-world data from a widely deployed digital therapeutic has the potential to predict AECOPD and can be used to confidently exclude the risk of exacerbations of COPD within the next 8 days.

Permission to use received from Henry Glyde.

Effectiveness of physical activity outcomes using a web-based Cardiac Rehabilitation application.

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 14:01:24 GMT

External Studies 5 October 2023

Charlotte Smith 1 Francesca D’angelo 2

University Hospital of Derby and Burton, Cardiac Rehabilitation Department, Burton Upon Trent, UK.
University Hospital of Derby and Burton, Health and Wellbeing Department, Burton, UK
To examine the effectiveness of physical activity outcomes using a web-based Cardiac Rehabilitation application compared with a conventional programme or a combination of both.

University Hospitals of Derby and Burton NHS Foundation Trust poster presented at the BACPR Annual Conference October 5-6th 2023

Permission to use received from Charlotte Smith

Effectiveness of psychological outcomes using a web-based Cardiac Rehabilitation application.

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 13:59:23 GMT

External Studies 5th October 2023

Francesca D’angelo 1 Charlotte Smith 2

University Hospital of Derby and Burton, Health and Wellbeing Department, Burton, UK
University Hospital of Derby and Burton, Cardiac Rehabilitation Department, Burton Upon Trent, UK.
To examine the effectiveness of psychological outcomes using a web-based Cardiac Rehabilitation application compared with a conventional programme or a combination of both.

University Hospitals of Derby and Burton NHS Foundation Trust poster presented at the BACPR Annual Conference October 5-6th 2023 Poster presented at the BACPR Annual Conference October 5-6th 2023

Permission to use received from Charlotte Smith

Characterising user engagement with mHealth for chronic disease self-management and impact on machine learning performance.

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 13:55:44 GMT

Research MMH-R07 published in Published on Nature 12 March 2024

Christopher Duckworth 1 Bethany Cliffe 2. Brian Pickering 1 Ben Ainsworth 2 Alison Blythin 3 Adam Kirk 3 Adam Kirk Thomas M. A. Wilkinson 3,4,5 Michael J. Boniface 1 1

IT Innovation Centre, Digital Health and Biomedical Engineering, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK.
2. School of Psychology, Faculty of Environmental and Life Sciences, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK
my mHealth Limited, London, UK.
National Institute for Health Research Applied Research Collaboration Wessex, University of Southampton , Southampton , GB
Faculty of Medicine, University of Southampton, Southampton , GB
Mobile Health (mHealth) has the potential to be transformative in the management of chronic conditions. Machine learning can leverage self-reported data collected with apps to predict periods of increased health risk, alert users, and signpost interventions. Despite this, mHealth must balance the treatment burden of frequent self-reporting and predictive performance and safety.

Here we report how user engagement with a widely used and clinically validated mHealth app, myCOPD (designed for the self-management of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease), directly impacts the performance of a machine learning model predicting an acute worsening of condition (i.e., exacerbations). We classify how users typically engage with myCOPD, finding that 60.3% of users engage frequently, however, less frequent users can show transitional engagement (18.4%), becoming more engaged immediately ( < 21 days) before exacerbating.

Machine learning performed better for users who engaged the most, however, this performance decrease can be mostly offset for less frequent users who engage more near exacerbation. We conduct interviews and focus groups with myCOPD users, highlighting digital diaries and disease acuity as key factors for engagement. Users of mHealth can feel overburdened when self-reporting data necessary for predictive modelling and confidence of recognising exacerbations is a significant barrier to accurate self-reported data.

We demonstrate that users of mHealth should be encouraged to engage when they notice changes to their condition (rather than clinically defined symptoms) to achieve data that is still predictive for machine learning, while reducing the likelihood of disengagement through desensitisation.

Exploring the Validity of GOLD 2023 Guidelines: Should GOLD C and D Be Combined?

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 13:50:20 GMT

Research MMH-R06 published in Published on Pub Med 24th October 2023

Christopher Duckworth 1 Michael J Boniface 1 Adam Kirk 2 Thomas M A Wilkinson 2 3 4

IT Innovation Centre, Digital Health and Biomedical Engineering, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK.
my mHealth Limited, London, UK.
National Institute for Health Research Applied Research Collaboration Wessex, University of Southampton , Southampton , GB
Faculty of Medicine, University of Southampton, Southampton , GB
Introduction: The GOLD (Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease) 2023 guidelines proposed important changes to the stratification of disease severity using the "ABCD" assessment tool. The highest risk groups "C" and "D" were combined into a single category "E" based on exacerbation history, no longer considering symptomology.

Purpose: We quantify the differential disease progression of individuals initially stratified by the GOLD 2022 "ABCD" scheme to evaluate these proposed changes.

Patients and methods: We utilise data collected from 1529 users of the myCOPD mobile app, a widely used and clinically validated app supporting people living with COPD in the UK. For patients in each GOLD group, we quantify symptoms using COPD Assessment Tests (CAT) and rate of exacerbation over a 12-month period post classification.

Results: CAT scores for users initially classified into GOLD C and GOLD D remain significantly different after 12 months (Kolmogorov-Smirnov statistic = 0.59, P = 8.2 × 10-23). Users initially classified into GOLD C demonstrate a significantly lower exacerbation rate over the 12 months post classification than those initially in GOLD D (Kolmogorov-Smirnov statistic = 0.26; P = 3.1 × 10-2; all exacerbations). Further, those initially classified as GOLD B have higher CAT scores and exacerbation rates than GOLD C in the following 12 months.

Conclusion: CAT scores remain important for stratifying disease progression both in-terms of symptomology and future exacerbation risk. Based on this evidence, the merger of GOLD C and GOLD D should be reconsidered.

Observing Digital Cardiac Rehabilitation using myHeart During the First Wave of COVID-19: A Real-World Multicentre Evaluation.

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 13:43:48 GMT

Published on omicsonline.org, 15 May 2023

Alison M. Blythin 1 Jack Elkes 2 Ronie Walter 3 Amber Bhogal 1 Ian Thompson

Thomas van Lindholm 1 Matt Smith 1 Trish Gorely 3 Tom M.A. Wilkinson 1,5 Stephen J. Leslie 3,4 and Adam Kirk 1

my mhealth Limited, London, UK
Imperial College London Clinical Trials Unit, London, UK
University of the Highlands and Islands, SCOTLAND
NHS Highlands Cardiology Department, SCOTLAND
University of Southampton Faculty of Medicine, UK
COVID-19 significantly impacted cardiac rehabilitation (CR) delivery. Service disruption left numerous patients without treatment access. Many healthcare teams made use of digital apps to support CR delivery and patients remotely. This evaluation aimed to analyse digital CR access from the myHeart interactive, cloud-based self-management app during the pandemic.

Five NHS secondary care CR services agreed to combine existing anonymised app data between Mar-Oct 2020 for 12-weeks to align as much as possible with traditional CR models.

No statistically significant differences were observed across age groups or gender between users who activated myHeart and those who did not. N=314/350 (89.7%) users accessed 5,469 CR videos with N=313/314 (99.7%) accessing 3,606 within the first 6-weeks of activation. No statistically significant differences were observed across gender or age group for education video views. Users with angina only diagnosis accessed more exercise videos than those with other reported diagnoses. Patient user feedback responses showed a statistically significant increase in self-management confidence following myHeart access.

myHeart provided remote timely CR during service disruption. This evaluation is the beginning of a journey to understand app usage however further research is needed to fully understand the role digital health can play in the delivery of CR.f your post goes he re. To edit this text, click on it and delete this default text and start typing your own or paste your own from a different source.

Can digital health apps provide patients with support to promote structured diabetes education and ongoing self-management?

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 13:35:48 GMT

A real-world evaluation of myDiabetes usage. Published in SAGE journals 11 March 2022.

A.M. Blythin 1, J. Elkes 2 T. van Lindholm 1 A. Bhogal 1 T.M.A. Wilkinson 1 C. Saville 3 A. Kirk 1

Department of Research & Innovation, my mhealth Limited, Bournemouth, UK.
School of Public Health, Imperial College Clinical Trials Unit, London, UK.
Faculty of Medicine, University of Southampton, Southampton, Hampshire, UK
Digital health interventions provide a potential solution to improve diabetes education delivery at population scale, overcoming barriers identified with traditional approaches. This evaluation analysed usage data for people with type 2 diabetes focusing on digital structured diabetes education.

Results showed a positive uptake and usage with myDiabetes, with increases in app activity post-COVID. No statistically significant differences were observed between gender or age for those activated. No statistically significant differences observed in education video views across age groups, gender, diabetes treatment type or smoking status.

The findings support the use of digital health in the provision of additional support for the delivery of diabetes education. There is potential for increasing diabetes education rates by offering patients a digital option in combination with traditional service delivery which should be substantiated through future research.

Standardized evaluation of the quality and persuasiveness of mobile health applications for diabetes management

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 13:32:29 GMT

Mobile health applications (MHA) have been found to be a promising technological approach to support self-management.

Published in Nature on 7 March 2022

A. Geirhos 1 M. Stephan 2 M. Wehrle 3 et al Sci Rep 12, 3639 (2022).

Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, Institute of Psychology and Education, Faculty of Engineering, Computer Science and Psychology, Ulm University, Ulm, Germany
Department of Rehabilitation Psychology and Psychotherapy, Albert-Ludwigs University Freiburg, Freiburg, Germany
Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, Institute of Psychology and Education, Faculty of Engineering, Computer Science and Psychology, Ulm University, Ulm, Germany

Mobile health applications (MHA) have been found to be a promising technological approach to support self-management.

A German study has revealed results from an evaluation of diabetes self-management mobile health applications.

The Mobile App Rating Scale (MARS), rated on a 5-point scale, was used for analysis.

120 mobile health apps from the European Google Play Store and the Apple App store were included.

Results identified myDiabetes as highest of all 120 evaluated mobile health apps, according to:

Quality
Concordance with recommended self-management tasks
Implementation of persuasive system design principle

myDiabetes overall MARS Score = 4.62

Permission to use received from Dr L. B. Sander

Understanding NICE Early Value Assessments: What do they mean for Healthcare?

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 13:20:51 GMT

By Maryam Tariq, Clinical Engagement Specialist at my mhealth

As the world changes around us, the NHS not only needs to keep up with this change but also transcend the increasing needs and demands placed on this behemoth system.

I sidestepped into the world of digital technology about 6 years ago after spending a decade on the front line and experiencing firsthand the challenges of providing care with increasing demand but limited supply. To say I was naïve to the world of technology is an understatement and I very quickly came to realise that whilst the mode of delivery was different, the barriers and hurdles were not.

Technology encompasses all aspects of our lives and without sounding archaic, there seems to be an app for everything! Undoubtedly this has made navigating everyday tasks easier but where does this leave healthcare and how we validate and standardise the approach to health technology?

Successful Pilot Study Paves the Way for Widespread Deployment of myAsthma across NHS Cambridgeshire & Peterborough

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 08:39:53 GMT

NHS Cambridgeshire & Peterborough has chosen the myAsthma app for widespread deployment across the ICS.

In a significant stride towards addressing health inequalities and improving asthma management, NHS Cambridgeshire & Peterborough has chosen the myAsthma app for widespread deployment across the ICS. This announcement follows the resounding success of the myAsthma Project conducted last year within the ICS.

Funded by NHSx, the focus of the myAsthma Project was to target 9 primary care practices with the highest health care utilisation and level of deprivation associated with asthma in Cambridgeshire & Peterborough, to evaluate the effectiveness of the myAsthma app.

Asthma is a common respiratory condition, but stark disparities in prevalence and associated healthcare outcomes are evident across the UK. Shedding light on this issue, a report from Asthma & Lung UK, titled "On the edge: how inequality affects people with asthma,"1. reveals those in deprived communities face both a higher prevalence of asthma and higher likelihood of hospitalisation. The report calls for the promotion of self-management in asthma but recognises the challenges in embedding effective self-management practices in groups with low health literacy.

myAsthma, designed and developed by my mhealth, offers a self-management platform for individuals living with adult asthma, and includes expert education and inhaler technique training and much more. myAsthma has been designed to support improved health literacy, drive patient empowerment to achieve greater disease control and ultimately help reduce the frequency of exacerbations and unplanned healthcare utilisation.

The results from the project were promising and have supported the case to extend the implementation across Cambridgeshire & Peterborough ICS.

Dr Sripat Pai, GP Clinical Lead, Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Integrated Care System comments:

"myAsthma provides our local people with asthma with the tools they need to self-manage more effectively and clinicians with a way to remotely monitor, manage and support their patients in an efficient way. The results of this pilot study have been extremely encouraging, particularly in our more deprived communities, and we look forward to seeing the impact the myAsthma App will bring once available for our wider population.”

With the deployment of the myAsthma app underway across the region, Cambridgeshire & Peterborough are poised to lead the way in tackling asthma health inequalities and empower their asthma population.

Supporting the implementation and rollout of the app, NHS Cambridgeshire & Peterborough have the support of the my mhealth Digital Health Advisers, who can provide workforce resource whilst driving digital literacy and inclusion.

If you are interested in replicating the success of myAsthma in Cambridgeshire & Peterborough in your own service, please get in touch www.mymhealth.com/contact-us

References: 1 . https://www.asthmaandlung.org.uk/sites/default/files/2023-03/auk-health-inequalities-final.pdf

my mhealth and Kent and Medway ICB extend their successful 3 year partnership to support long term condition management

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 08:36:52 GMT

Following the successful delivery of myDiabetes across Kent and Medway, which has seen over 12,000 individuals provided with access to support their ongoing self-management, my mhealth and Kent and Medway ICB have agreed on a new partnership.

This collaboration extends access to the my mhealth platform to support patients living with COPD, heart disease, and asthma, while also maintaining its support for individuals living with diabetes.

The myCOPD, myAsthma, myDiabetes and myHeart apps all form part of the my mhealth digital hub, a digital therapeutic platform that provides patients with tailored, evidence-based digital interventions which improve health outcomes and reduce health service dependence. The digital hub features range from education, condition-specific intervention to rehabilitation and much more.

The NHS Long Term Plan prioritises the establishment of personalised care as the norm, and promoting supported self-management is an integral part of this dedication. My mhealth’s digital hub platform is designed to make the ambitions of the Long Term Plan a reality.

Through the clinical dashboards, the my mhealth platform will enable clinical teams to deliver supported self-management, track an individual patient’s response to treatment, and assess the needs of the patients and services at a population scale. These insights will, in turn, help Kent & Medway to further optimise their service delivery and prioritise care.

Head of Customer Success for my mhealth, Jane Stokes comments:

“We are delighted to witness the ongoing success of myDiabetes in Kent & Medway. By extending provision to patients living with asthma, COPD and cardiovascular disease, we are creating a great opportunity to help services to empower patients in their self-management, to improve their condition control and optimise their health care utilisation. We are proud to be a part of Kent’s digital transformation journey”.

Ian Butcher, Senior Programme Manager & Pride Network Co-Chair Cardiovascular, Network NHS Kent & Medway adds:

“All of us at Kent & Medway ICB have been delighted to witness the positive adoption of the myDiabetes self-management platform. As myDiabetes continues to prove a real success to our patients, our digital transformation journey naturally led us to collaborate as an ICB and expand these benefits to individuals dealing with Heart Disease, Asthma, and COPD. With this expansion we strive to empower an increasing number of patients throughout our region, fostering their confidence and enhancing their sense of control when it comes to their management of their long-term condition".

If you want to find out more about how the my mhealth platform can support the ambitions of your health service please get in touch here, or call us on 0044 (0)1202 299 583.

PROPEL myCOPD Project Brief- Exploring the Implementation of myCOPD in NHS Respiratory Services

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 08:33:44 GMT

Following bid writing support from the West of England AHSN, SBRI Healthcare, an Accelerated Access Collaborative initiative, in collaboration with the Academic Health Science Networks (AHSNs) and Asthma + Lung UK, awarded funding to my mhealth Limited to support respiratory patients in January 2023

myCOPD offers COPD patients the potential to manage their condition remotely, reducing the need for frequent medical visits and hospital admissions. The project aims to build capacity in both primary and secondary care settings and improve patient outcomes.

The funding, provided through the SBRI Phase 3 grant, aims to explore the implementation of myCOPD, a digital therapeutic developed by my mhealth Limited, in two regions of the NHS with diverse populations and challenges.

Setting 1- Acute Setting- North Bristol NHS Trust and University Hospitals Bristol and Weston NHS Foundation Trust

In North Bristol NHS Trust and University Hospitals Bristol and Weston NHS Foundation Trust we will assess the value of using myCOPD in patients admitted to hospital with an exacerbation and its ability to help prevent readmissions.

The primary outcome is to explore whether myCOPD supports patients to self-manage at home with clinical oversight reducing the risk of hospital readmission as part of the respiratory discharge bundle.

Hospital readmission rates for patients with COPD over 12- months following discharge with change in annualised hospitalisation will be collected for those using myCOPD and those who choose not to. Data relating to each patient’s admissions during the 12 months prior to enrolment will also be collected. Secondary outcomes include benefits to the acute workforce, healthcare utilisation, welfare and quality of life scores, environmental social benefit, myCOPD app usage and usage feedback.

Setting 2- Pulmonary Rehabilitation- Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust

In Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust we will work with local services to provide 'digital-PR' to isolated communities and increase the capacity and access to specialist support for self-management.

The primary outcome is to explore whether using a digital blended approach increases PR delivery and completion rates with improved outcome measures.

The total number of patients who were offered, started and completed PR using myCOPD to support a menu-based approach will be collected. The uptake rate, completion rate and level of completion (if not 100%) will also be analysed. Secondary outcomes include admission data, healthcare resource utilisation, welfare and quality of life scores, myCOPD app usage and usage feedback.

Full the full project brief please click here-

https://www.weahsn.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/PROPEL-myCOPD_Project-Brief.pdf

my mhealth Shortlisted for 'Most Improved Patient Outcomes' Award

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 08:27:29 GMT

We are delighted to have been shortlisted in the Health Tech World Award for 'Most Improved Patient Outcomes'.

We are delighted to have been shortlisted in the Health Tech World Award for “Most Improved Patient Outcomes”

The award ceremony was a highly competitive event, celebrating the brightest stars in health tech and we are honoured to be among other companies that are passionate about health tech. This recognition underscores the quality, diversity, and dynamism of our sector, and we take great pride in being a part of it.

We were particularly delighted to receive an honourable mention, which specifically recognized the scalability and evidence behind our platform. Scalability is a crucial aspect of any health tech solution. The my mhealth digital therapeutic platform was designed with scalability in mind, to enable implementation across various healthcare settings, reaching a wide range of patients and healthcare providers across multiple long term conditions.

At my mhealth, we strive to make sure our digital therapeutics are evidence based and deliver the expected outcomes. Our dedicated research team has undertaken a number of clinical trials and real-world studies to ensure the platform is effective and able to support health services and patients. To learn more about the evidence supporting the my mhealth digital platform, please visit www.mymhealth.com/studies

Being recognized for our efforts to improve patient outcomes is a testament to our commitment to delivering cutting-edge solutions that benefit patients and healthcare providers. We believe that our platform has the potential to revolutionize the healthcare industry, and we are committed to playing our part in this transformation, improving patient outcomes, and changing healthcare for the better.

Thank you to the judges and congratulations to all the winners and finalists.

The journey to 100k users- a my mhealth milestone to remember

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 08:21:14 GMT

my mhealth is proud to announce that it has reached a significant milestone of 100,000 users on its digital therapeutics platform.

The my mhealth platform for long-term conditions is designed to enhance service delivery, supporting improved patient outcomes, increased patient access and engagement, resulting in improved use of healthcare resources.

Founded in 2012 by two respiratory physicians, Dr Simon Bourne and Professor Tom Wilkinson set out to provide a comprehensive platform for managing respiratory conditions, to reach more patients and deliver quality care at scale. Since then, the platform has rapidly expanded to cover four major long term conditions; Asthma, COPD, diabetes and heart disease.

What was the inspiration behind the my mhealth platform?

Dr Simon Bourne saw the potential digital could have in his own work.

“I was a respiratory consultant at the time in Southampton running the community COPD team. It became clear early that the service did not have the capacity to deliver expert care to all 6000 people diagnosed with that condition in the city. I have always been interested in tech and websites and saw this as a way of reaching a much larger population, as long as we could prove the standard of service was at least equal to a face-face intervention. So we launched my mhealth limited at Southampton Science Park, and with funding from the SBRI, built and trialled the world’s first digital therapeutic for patients with COPD”.

Similarly, drawing on his own experience, Professor Tom Wilkinson comments

“As a clinician caring for patients with chronic lung conditions it was clear that many patients weren’t receiving the key aspects of care they required to optimise their health. Our NHS team was expert but small and there was not enough capacity to support every patient when they needed it. The inspiration for our first app myCOPD were the patients who had become truly expert in managing their own condition, understood what to do and when to reach for help. The my mhealth platform was developed to support and empower everyone to self-manage effectively and the drive to spread that across the NHS for all patients has been the key to our progress.”

What does this achievement mean?

"Reaching the milestone of 100,000 registered users not only indicates a growing demand for innovative healthcare solutions but is also a testament to the company's unwavering dedication to transforming healthcare by providing cutting-edge technology and innovative solutions that address the evolving needs of patients and healthcare providers."

Commenting on the journey, Professor Tom Wilkinson said:

“By any standards this is a remarkable achievement which everyone in the company, our clinical partners and collaborators should be proud of. 10 years ago, Simon and I imagined that if we developed and tested digital therapeutics in the right way we could support more patients than we ever could using conventional models of care. That vision is now a reality. A clinician can see 10-20 patients in a clinic- and may get to review a patient every six months or more. With the my mhealth platform we can help support 100,000 users daily and that number is growing exponentially now. That’s a lifetime of a practitioner’s positive clinical impact delivered everyday of the year- which is such a great outcome.”

Dr Simon Bourne shares his thoughts:

“This is a huge milestone in the history of digital therapeutics. We knew that the digital therapeutics, once in the hands of patients could improve the outcomes and symptoms of patients, and once a patient was invited to download the app, activation and engagement was excellent. The problem to solve was, how do we get this to patients with a confirmed diagnosis of the condition. It took us a while to develop the solutions with NHS partners that would enable us to scale to more than 100,000 users. The key was the development of a new role, known as a digital health adviser, who work between the digital therapeutic, the patient and the service to drive uptake and engagement”.

What’s next for my mhealth?

The company is well positioned to continue leading the way in digital therapeutics and making a positive impact on the lives of many worldwide.

“We are deploying our digital therapeutics for long-term conditions now across more ICB footprints this year. Working with NHS partners we can now scale this to improve outcomes of patients, and within current budget constraints. We are planning our US launch, initially with myCOPD and translating our myHeart app with European clinical teams to enter clinical trials soon. With NIHR funding, through the NHSx AI awards we are also investigating other solutions to improve the outcomes of patients with COPD”.

Said Dr Simon Bourne.

Looking to the future, Professor Tom Wilkinson comments

“The real impacts of our work are ahead- we are rapidly growing our user base, working with more and more clinical teams and synergistically driving an evolution into digitally enhanced care at a time the NHS really needs it. Excitingly are expanding overseas to India, the US and into Europe, building our evidence base for efficacy and value as we go. For a decade we have been at the vanguard of digital therapeutic development and delivery and in another 10 years we aim to be a major contributor to improvements in global health”.

UK digital therapeutic pioneer, my mhealth, has been awarded funding to accelerate the adoption of digitally enhanced respiratory care pathways

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 16:07:59 GMT

SBRI Healthcare , an Accelerated Access Collaborative initiative, in partnership with the Academic Health Science Networks (AHSNs) and Asthma + Lung UK , has selected my mhealth Limited as one of their grant recipients to support respiratory patients.

The SBRI Healthcare ‘Competition 21, Phase 3 for Real-world Testing and Implementation: Respiratory Diseases’ identifies the most promising innovations that will help the NHS continue to evolve, meet more patient needs whilst addressing some of the biggest healthcare challenges; one of which is respiratory diseases.

With up to half of all hospital beds being occupied by patients with respiratory illnesses, supporting discharges, preventing disease exacerbations and readmissions is key to ensuring the NHS can manage the huge number of patients needing help. myCOPD, a digital therapeutic from my mhealth, can support this.

The funding from SBRI Healthcare will be used to support real-world testing and implementation of my mhealth's platform in respiratory care pathways across the UK. The goal of the project is to measure the clinical and economic benefits of digital therapeutics in respiratory care, which will help to pave the way for widespread adoption across the NHS.

"We are thrilled to have been awarded this funding by SBRI Healthcare, which will allow us to accelerate the adoption of our digital therapeutic platform in the UK. We believe that our platform has the potential to revolutionize respiratory care management"

said Professor Tom Wilkinson, Professor & Honorary NHS Consultant Respiratory Medicine Southampton University Faculty of Medicine and my mhealth's Chief Science Officer and Co-Founder.

"myCOPD is a powerful tool and we are excited to work with healthcare providers in Bristol and Cornwall to demonstrate its impact on patient outcomes and reduce the burden on the NHS. We would like to thank the West of England AHSN for their support throughout the funding process and look forward to working with the NHS and other healthcare partners to bring our digital therapeutic platform to more patients across the UK.

The implementation of myCOPD into respiratory care pathways will be explored in two distinct UK regions, Bristol & Cornwall."

Cheryl Scott, Industry and Innovation Lead at the West of England AHSN added:

"We’re delighted that my mhealth has been successful in securing this funding in order to support people with respiratory diseases and our health and care delivery partners in the West of England. We continue to p rovide support and look forward to seeing the impacts of the research study.”

my mhealth is also working with NICE to develop the evidence and health economic model required to support the national roll out of my COPD.

If you want to find out more about this project or learn how myCOPD can help your respiratory patients, please get in touch here.

my mhealth and their NHS partners announce the national rollout of myAsthma Biologic, a digital therapeutic designed to support patients with severe asthma

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 16:03:21 GMT

Simon Bourne, Company President at my mhealth comments:

“As a respiratory focussed digital therapeutics company, we are honoured to have been chosen to roll out our product nationally to better support patients on biologics, who are living with Severe Asthma. We have already seen the huge potential of digital therapeutics to improve patients’ symptoms and quality of life and deliver efficiencies across primary and community health care services, and look forward to working with the specialist severe asthma centres across the UK."

Professor James Dodd, clinical lead North Bristol’s complex airways service added:

“The Bristol severe Asthma service is delighted to be part of this national project to adopt and evaluate the myAsthma Biologic App. With the growing number of highly effective monoclonal antibody therapies, and the growing demand on our services, we believe that digital therapeutics like myAsthma Biologic will be increasingly important. Digital innovation has the potential to complement our dedicated multi-disciplinary team to increase capacity and enhance the support patients need to keep them well.”

About my mhealth

my mhealth’s digital therapeutics have been prescribed to over 90,000 patients with chronic conditions, resulting in reduced morbidity and hospital admissions. It serves patients across a range of long-term conditions, including COPD, asthma, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Real world and clinical trial evidence demonstrates the efficacy of digital interventions on the my mhealth platform.

For more information on my mhealth, visit www.mymhealth.com

Digital Health Advisers – The ‘person connection’ in Digital Health

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 15:41:08 GMT

my mhealth recognised there was a need to create person-centred digital app delivery and support which led to the development of the DHA

The digital revolution in healthcare

Digital health interventions such as wellness, self-care and activity apps have been shown to promote healthy behaviours such as smoking cessation, reduced alcohol intake, support with exercise, and eating a healthy diet⁶. Furthermore, recent evidence shows they can improve outcomes for patients with long-term conditions⁶'⁷'⁸'⁹, and importantly, they can improve accessibility to health-related information. Pre-pandemic the uptake of digital health technologies was slow²'¹⁰, however with the emergence of COVID-19, they became an immediate necessity and digital health adoption was greatly accelerated within healthcare service delivery¹¹'¹². NHS Digital reported a 111% usage increase in NHS app registrations¹³.

Despite digital health interventions offering numerous benefits, a great challenge is promoting uptake and engagement¹⁴'¹⁵'¹⁶. Making an App available to clinical teams and patients is unlikely to be enough to drive adoption and engagement. Instead, when deploying a solution, it’s imperative that the local needs of healthcare teams and their patients are considered carefully and a personal approach is taken. To ensure healthcare teams receive the necessary support to implement digital self-management apps with a personal touch, my mhealth created the Digital Health Adviser (DHA).

The Digital Health Adviser

my mhealth recognised there was a need to create person-centred digital app delivery and support which led to the development of the DHA. By bringing together the tec hnology and the needs of the service the perceived ‘heavy lift’ challenge of a digital transformation project has been reduced.This role works in partnership with my mhealth and the healthcare provider using an honorary contract. The healthcare team provides them with a list of patients to contact and offer the app(s). Those patients who would like to use the app(s) are offered guidance on how to use and are signposted to content related to goals set by the clinical teams. Similarly, the DHA’s support clinicians to engage with the technology, providing them with the skills to support, enhance and scale their service.

Since the creation of this new role, the benefits became evident very quickly. As a result, we now have a team of DHA’s working with NHS healthcare services across the country. They bridge the gap between the digital health platform, the clinician and the patient to support app uptake and engagement. Importantly, they promote digital inclusion and encourage the creation of local community digital champions. Figure 1 shows the increase in app usage for just five NHS sites since the DHA role was implemented.

Case StudiesIn Mid and South Essex (MSE) DHA support was provided to compliment a drive from the clinical services to engage patients in myDiabetes. This saw an increase in app registrations from 1654 to 6356 users within 2 years, demonstrating a 284% increase. Furthermore, within 1 year in-app education video activity increased from 10,316 to 21,272
Knowsley saw an increase in app registration from 277 to 3788 following DHA implementation over 2 years (1267% increase)
Using the DHA, Cambridge and Peterborough CCG provided continuous access to education and self-management support using myAsthma, promoting equal access to the service for the local population. Nine practices with the highest healthcare utilisation were provided with 900 myAsthma licenses. All of these were supplied to patients within 6 months, of which 720 (80%) of patients activated the app.
Kent and Medway CCG have registered over 6000 patients to the myDiabetes app in support of Structured Diabetes Education, driving a 200% increase in enrolment to the programme in 18 months.

Providing the ‘human’ connection in digital health Studies have shown that providing ‘human’ support in digital health interventions improves patient engagement¹⁷. The DHA is the person-link between digital health apps, clinicians and patient users, providing a structured route for the implementation of digital therapeutics into the NHS at population scale, reaching high levels of user engagement. The interaction of the DHA with clinical teams is vital to increasing confidence in using technology for both clinicians and patients, working towards reducing digital exclusion. The DHA’s are in constant contact with clinical teams to support their service and patients to encourage usage to promote self-management. They are also able to obtain important feedback of how the app(s) are functioning in the real-world.

Some comments received from clinical teams are:

“The DHA oversees the smooth running of patients who sign up for the app. They help patients with their many queries, and help the admin team to contact patients to take up the App. I could not do this part of my job without their input. Aside from the obvious impact they have on our patient’s education and management of their health, they are also enthusiastic and have a ‘can do’ attitude which really makes a difference when trying to encourage patients to use the app modules. They make my job much easier. I am so grateful for their help and feel totally supported at all times.”

(Healthcare Administrator)

“Working with my mhealth and the DHA’s has been invaluable to our practice. Their help and support has enabled them to give patients an informed choice on how to manage their chronic disease. Not only has this taken pressure off general practice it has given people the tools they need to improve and manage their own health.”

(Nurse Specialist)

Feedback from patients receiving DHA support include:

“Without your help I would have been 'out' of the my mhealth app for ever! Thank you so much for your patience and help with getting me started.”

“I have completed the exercises in Lifestyle tile is there another exercise tile or do I repeat what I have already completed? Your help would be appreciated.”

“Thank you for helping me - it's been a life changer for me and you can quote me on that.”

“For me personally to have someone as supportive as the DHA is as and when you need is invaluable. Diabetes is scary I'm still pretty new at finding out but the way your life works around it but with the proactiveness and correspondence and the regular updates from the DHA I don't know where I would be without it.”

As more healthcare services look to benefit from this support, the DHA team is expanding to meet the growing demand. Clinical partners are demonstrating a true step-change in the delivery of digital health to support healthcare delivery at population scale. Importantly, patients are provided with support both digitally and personally to self-manage their long-term condition without losing the human connection with their clinical teams.

References
Gardner T. Pressures on the NHS are far from ‘sustainable’ [Internet]. The Health Foundation. 2021 [cited 2022 Aug 24]. Available from: https://www.health.org.uk/news-and-comment/news/pressures-on-the-nhs-are-far-from-sustainable
Peek N, Sujan M, Scott P. Digital health and care in pandemic times : impact of COVID-19. BMJ Heal Care Informatics [Internet]. 2020;27:1–3. Available from: https://informatics.bmj.com/content/27/1/e100166
Royal College of General Practitioners. Chronic shortage of GPs is the reason patients are facing long waiting times for appointments [Internet]. RCGP. 2021 [cited 2022 Aug 24]. Available from: https://www.rcgp.org.uk/news/2021/september/chronic-shortage-of-gps-is-the-reason-patients-are-facing-long-waiting-times-for-appointments
United Lincolnshire Hospitals NHS Trust. Waiting for your outpatient appointment during the COVID-19 Pandemic [Internet]. NHS Trust. 2021 [cited 2022 Aug 24]. Available from: https://www.ulh.nhs.uk/patients/outpatients/waiting-for-your-outpatient-appointment-during-the-covid-19-pandemic/
Bene BA, O’Connor S, Mastellos N, Majeed A, Fadahunsi KP, O’Donoghue J. Impact of mobile health applications on self-management in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus: Protocol of a systematic review. BMJ Open. 2019;9(6).
Murray E, Hekler EB, Professor A, Andersson G, Collins LM, Doherty A, et al. Evaluating digital health interventions: key questions and approaches HHS Public Access Background & Aims. Am J Prev Med [Internet]. 2016;51(5):843–51. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5324832/pdf/nihms850074.pdf
Murray E, Ross J, Pal K, Li J, Dack C, Stevenson F, et al. A web-based self-management programme for people with type 2 diabetes: the HeLP-Diabetes research programme including RCT. Program Grants Appl Res. 2018;6(5):1–242.
Crooks MG, Elkes J, Storrar W, Roy K, North M, Blythin A, et al. Evidence generation for the clinical impact of myCOPD in patients with mild, moderate and newly diagnosed COPD: a randomised controlled trial. ERJ Open Res [Internet]. 2020;6(4):00460–2020. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1183/23120541.00460-2020
Nabutovsky I, Nachshon A, Klempfner R, Shapiro Y and TR. Digital Cardiac Rehabilitation Programs: The Future of Patient-Centred Medicine. Telemed e-Health [Internet]. 2020;26(1):34–41. Available from: https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/tmj.2018.0302#:~:text=These programs imply a high level of patient,no significant differences in mortality or hospitalizations
Pillay R. Digital Health Trends [Internet]. 2021. Available from: https://www.iqvia.com/-/media/iqvia/pdfs/institute-reports/digital-health-trends-2021/iqvia-institute-digital-health-trends-2021.pdf?&_=1630938621119
National Diabetes Audit. Improving attendance and data recording for structured education. 2018; Available from: https://www.diabetes.org.uk/resources-s3/2018-12/SE Guidance_ v3.pdf
DESMOND. MyDESMOND eLearning Platform [Internet]. 2019 [cited 2020 Sep 25]. Available from: https://www.desmond-project.org.uk/portfolio/mydesmond-elearning-platform/
Poinasamy K. Useful Digital Health Apps and Platforms [Internet]. BLF and Asthma UK. 2022 [cited 2022 Feb 7]. Available from: https://www.asthma.org.uk/support-us/campaigns/campaigns-blog/useful-digital-health-apps-and-platforms/
McGowan PT. Self-Management Education and Support in Chronic Disease Management. Prim Care Clin Off Pract [Internet]. 2012;39(2):307–25. Available from: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S009545431200019X?via%3Dihub
Murray E, Sweeting M, Dack C, Pal K, Modrow K, Hudda M, et al. Web-based self-management support for people with type 2 diabetes (HeLPDiabetes): Randomised controlled trial in English primary care. BMJ Open. 2017;7(9):1–11.
Torous J, Myrick KJ, Rauseo-Ricupero N, Firth J. Digital mental health and COVID-19: Using technology today to accelerate the curve on access and quality tomorrow. JMIR Ment Heal. 2020;7(3):1–6.
Ritterband LM, Thorndike FP, Cox DJ, Kovatchev BP, Gonder-Frederick LA. A behavior change model for internet interventions. Ann Behav Med. 2009;38(1):18–27.

About my mhealthmy mhealth’s digital therapeutics have been prescribed to over 80,000 patients with chronic conditions, resulting in reduced morbidity and hospital admissions. It serves patients across a range of long term conditions, including COPD, asthma, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Our flagship product, myCOPD, was the exclusive digital therapeutic deployed by the UK’s NHS to deliver pulmonary rehabilitation during the pandemic, when in person care was practically inaccessible. Real world and clinical trial evidence demonstrates the efficacy of digital interventions on the my mhealth platform.

For more information on my mhealth, visit www.mymhealth.com .

my mhealth announces appointment of David Pettigrew as their new CEO

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 15:33:42 GMT

my mhealth , a leading Digital Therapeutics (DTx) company based in the UK, is pleased to announce the promotion of Dr. David Pettigrew as CEO. David will guide the organisation in its mission to improve the quality of care for people with long term conditions, through digital health. Having spent time in the US successfully growing a healthcare technology business for a UK-based company, David is ideally placed to lead my mhealth’s expansion into the US market.

Dr. Pettigrew has a broad and extensive experience in the digital health industry. Throughout his 17 year career, he has been responsible for managing large and complex digital health product development projects, building new organisational capabilities and for overall business delivery. He was an early pioneer in developing FDA-regulated smartphone apps. Most recently, he led Sagentia, an AIM-listed international technology and product development business, and was part of BrightInsight’s leadership team, focusing on building DTx solutions for the medtech and pharmaceutical industry. David holds a DPhil in Molecular Biophysics from the University of Oxford.

David replaces the founder Simon Bourne, who is transitioning to President and will continue to take an active interest in developing my mhealth’s next generation AI capabilities.

Bourne commented:

"When I co-founded my mhealth over 10 years ago we set out to transform healthcare using digital platforms. Back then this was through a simple website developed to support COPD patients. We never imagined back then how much this simple tool would transform the lives of patients.

Following successful randomised clinical trials and NHS National Innovation Accelerator adoption, my mhealth has supported over 80,000 patients and multiple long-term conditions across the UK. During the pandemic, we delivered access to digital rehabilitation, when most services had to close. We are also proud of the contribution we made in easing capacity pressures in the NHS through our COVID virtual ward remote monitoring solution.

Today marks an important event in our history, as I hand over the CEO role to David Pettigrew. David has a proven track record, and having worked with him over the last 5 months in his role as Chief Strategy Officer, I have every confidence he will take my mhealth to the next level."

Pettigrew stated:

" Having spent 17 years developing DTx solutions, I can confidently say that no other company has been as successful as my mhealth in building such a vast and engaged user base. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Simon and the team for all their hard work to bring the company to where it is today. I’m honoured to be taking on the responsibility of leading my mhealth in the next stage of its journey, which will focus on launching in the US and beyond, expanding our relationship with the NHS and extending our data and clinical trial partnerships with the pharmaceutical industry. Our primary mission will continue to be improving the lives of patients with long term conditions everywhere."

About my mhealth

my mhealth’s digital therapeutics have been prescribed to over 80,000 patients with chronic conditions, resulting in reduced morbidity and hospital admissions. It serves patients across a range of long term conditions, including COPD, asthma, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Our flagship product, myCOPD, was the exclusive digital therapeutic deployed by the UK’s NHS to deliver pulmonary rehabilitation during the pandemic, when in person care was practically inaccessible. Real world and clinical trial evidence demonstrates the efficacy of digital interventions on the my mhealth platform.

For more information on my mhealth, visit www.mymhealth.com

Evaluation of diabetes self-management mobile health applications

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 15:28:09 GMT

A German study has identified myDiabetes as highest of all 120 evaluated mobile health apps according to quality, concordance with recommended self-management tasks and implementation of persuasive system design principles.

Prediction of Exacerbation Events using myCOPD data

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 15:26:02 GMT

Results demonstrated that self-reported COPD data, using a digital health app, can be used to identify users at risk of exacerbation within 3 days with moderate discriminative ability (AUROC 0.727, 95% CI 0.720-0.735). Further research utilising additional linked data (particularly from medical devices such as smart inhalers, physiological monitoring sensors, and environmental sensors) are expected to increase the accuracy of these models.

Data self-reported to health care apps designed to remotely monitor patients with COPD can be used to predict acute exacerbation events with moderate performance. This could increase personalisation of care by allowing pre-emptive action to be taken to mitigate the risk of future exacerbation events.

With the Health and Social Care Secretary setting a target for 4 million to benefit from personalised care by March 2024, leveraging the data collected by these apps in prognostic models could provide increased personalisation of care by allowing pre-emptive action to be taken to mitigate the risk of future exacerbation events

©Francis P Chmiel, Dan K Burns, John Brian Pickering, Alison Blythin, Thomas MA Wilkinson, Michael J Boniface.

Originally published in JMIR Medical Informatics ( https://medinform.jmir.org/2022/3/e26499 ), 21.03.2022.

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work, first published in JMIR Medical Informatics, is properly cited. The complete bibliographic information, a link to the original publication onhttps://medinform.jmir.org/, as well as this copyright and license information must be included.

About my mhealth

For more information on my mhealth, visit www.mymhealth.com

myCOPD - Positive population health management

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 15:22:43 GMT

Evaluation of myCOPD - a positive population health management approach to the remote monitoring of patients with COPD.

The study showed a positive uptake and usage with myCOPD, demonstrating improvement in CAT scores. Socioeconomic factors did not appear to negatively influence app activation. See results from Dorset Intelligence and Insight Service (DiiS) and my mhealth collaboration, supporting the remote monitoring of patients with COPD.

About my mhealth

For more information on my mhealth, visit www.mymhealth.com

NHSX Digital Health Partnership Award funds the adoption of both myOp and myCOPD in four NHS centres

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 15:18:21 GMT

The NHSX Innovation Development Team has launched the Digital Health Partnership Award. This has been created to help NHS organisations in England to bid for funding to accelerate the adoption of digital health technologies to support patients with long term conditions focusing on supporting people at home. The Award brings together partners critical to the scaling of digital health technology.

my mhealth have partnered with North Bristol NHS Trust, University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust (UHS), Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and University Hospital of North Midlands NHS Trust to secure funding from NHSX that will enable the adoption of myOp, an app that supports the prehabilitation of patients prior to elective surgery, and myCOPD, a digital therapeutic for patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD).

COPD Self-management

myCOPD helps people living with COPD to perfect their inhaler technique with easy-to-follow inhaler videos and helps them to manage their COPD using a variety of interventions such as online pulmonary rehabilitation classes.

To promote digital healthcare North Bristol NHS Trust are introducing myCOPD to patients with COPD. This will support patients who have been admitted to hospital with their COPD, enhancing their recovery at home and reducing their risk of readmission. Patient activation and adoption will be analysed by University of Bath, and the West of England AHSN will report on the outcomes, benefits, and evidence of impact realisation.

Surgical Prehabilitation

myOp is a universal intervention which gives people waiting for elective surgery the tools they need to prepare and recover faster. myOp includes a series of screening tools which clinicians can use to rapidly risk stratify and identify patients at a higher risk of complications. These patients can then be supported with targeted support and interventions.

UHS will deliver this intervention to patients undergoing certain types of surgery. The aim is to initially support patients to use technology to prepare for surgery and improve their physical and mental health. Results will be analysed by UHS alongside Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and University Hospital of North Midlands NHS Trust

my mhealth CEO Simon Bourne commented,

"We’ve witnessed digital services like myCOPD and myOp achieve great adoption across the UK and thanks to the funding provided by the Digital Health Partnership Award digital therapeutics will be available to even more people living with long-term conditions or waiting for surgery."

Dr Harry Thirkettle, the mind behind of myOp added,

"Up to 30% of surgical patients experience some form of complication after surgery, leading to increased healthcare costs and a longer stay in hospital for the patient. With Covid-19 leading to huge waiting lists and a backlog of elective surgery, it's more important than ever that we find ways to improve efficiency, reduce complications and length of stay. A variety of prehabilitation interventions can reduce complication rates by up to 50%. We’ve combined these interventions into a single app and we’re confident that with this award, we’ll be able to support many more people from decision to operate to full recovery."

If you want to find out more about this award or how myOp and myCOPD can help your patients or if you need support with an NHSX award application to support your health service's digital transformation, please get in touch here or call us on +44 (0)1202 299 583.

my mhealth launches COPD app in New Zealand in partnership with Vodafone and district health board

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 15:14:48 GMT

myCOPD is the first digital self-management programme for COPD to be available in New Zealand

Digital therapeutics pioneer my mhealth has announced the first international rollout of its digital therapeutic, myCOPD in New Zealand . The rollout is initially focused on the Māori and Pasifika population, a first for a British made digital self-management programme designed specifically for COPD.

Within one District Health Board (DHB), around 300 patients will be the first in the country to have access to the app, with an aim to expand patient access. Over the last 2 years of working closely together, with COVID impacting initial launch plans, my mhealth and the leading DHB have the first COPD patients now benefiting from the online therapeutic. myCOPD provides patients with access to a digital self-management programme, perfecting inhaler technique with easy-to-follow inhaler videos, access to online pulmonary rehabilitation and learning how to manage their COPD from world experts. All of this enables healthcare professionals to remotely monitor symptoms of COPD, evolve and enhance service access for patients.

COPD is a major respiratory disease in New Zealand. An estimated 15% (200,000) of all New Zealanders aged over 45 years suffer from the condition and is the fourth leading cause of death in the region behind cancer, heart disease and stroke. The DHB set out to find a new digital solution to improve patient care as well as reducing costs of unnecessary admissions and discrepancies surrounding the access to and availability of healthcare. Following investment from Vodafone New Zealand, the clear objective is to improve the health of COPD patients and their access to services, with part of the population disproportionately affected with a prevalence twice that of other ethnic groups1.

The DHB selected myCOPD as the chosen solution, as the platform provides the key requirements local patients asked for, as well as the capacity to serve as a blueprint for other chronic conditions such as heart failure and diabetes. All of these have similar needs that are currently not being met due to lack of sufficient funding. Currently in the UK the app is used by over 50,000 people, improving the quality of care and the frequency of their check-ins.

Global Lead for my mhealth, Ian Thompson, commented:

"All of us here at my mhealth are excited to bring myCOPD into New Zealand and into the respiratory teams hands at the DHB. We have been working together for almost 2 years to get this moving; the global pandemic prevented us getting started a year ago, but through hard work by all involved, we have finally got the first patients on board myCOPD.

The main part of our work is focused on ensuring adaptations that are needed to the platform meet the needs of the Māori and Pasifika populations. We also want to recognise the support from Vodafone NZ, who have provided funds for this initial program. This support from Vodafone NZ puts the local digital health economy on its first steps towards its digital evolution, supporting the access of services into the homes of patients across the DHB and beyond for those suffering with COPD. This is something we have been doing with the NHS for a number of years and hope our learnings can accelerate the digital adoption."

Chief Enterprise Officer at Vodafone NZ, Lindsay Zwart, added:

"We’re constantly looking out for world-class digital solutions to enhance the lives of New Zealanders, and my mhealth exemplifies this approach. This initial deployment with the DHB will enable us to test whether the myCOPD app can help to improve the health and future outcomes for COPD patients in the region, and if this technology can be rolled out further around New Zealand."

If you're a healthcare professional or clinician and want to know more about how myCOPD can help your patients - anywhere in the world, you can find out more at www.mymhealth.com or by calling my mhealth on 0044 (0)1202 299 583

References

1. Nation Health Committee (2013) Respiratory Disease in New Zealand

my mhealth and University of Southampton announced as Round 2 Winner of The Artificial Intelligence in Health and Care Award

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 15:08:25 GMT

The Artificial Intelligence in Health and Care Award aims to benefit patients by combining the power of artificial intelligence with the expertise of the NHS to improve health and care outcomes

The Artificial Intelligence in Health and Care Award aims to benefit patients by combining the power of artificial intelligence with the expertise of the NHS to improve health and care outcomes.

my mhealth Limited and the University of Southampton have been announced as a winner of the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Artificial Intelligence in Health and Care Award. The design of mySmartCOPD was one of nine projects to achieve funding at Phase 2 in Round 2 of the programme.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a serious yet common disease affecting the lungs. Patients with COPD often experience ‘exacerbation events’ which are acute worsening of symptoms that frequently lead to hospitalisation. The development of mySmartCOPD aims to use machine-learning and artificial intelligence to predict exacerbations several days in advance and transform person-centred COPD management. Preventing exacerbations is essential to promote health, and reduce the burden on patients and the NHS.

The award is one of the programmes of the NHS AI Lab at NHSX and is run by the Accelerated Access Collaborative (AAC) in partnership with the NIHR. Each round of the Award supports technologies at different levels of maturity, targeting health and care improvements where they are needed most, by both patients and NHS staff.

The AI in Health and Care Award is increasing the impact of AI systems in helping to solve both clinical and operational challenges across the NHS, including reducing waiting times, improving early diagnosis and saving staff time. It will speed up the most promising technologies through the regulatory process by building an evidence base to demonstrate the effectiveness and safety of artificial intelligence in health and care.

Co-founder of my mhealth Limited and Chief Scientific Officer, Professor Tom Wilkinson said:

"This award recognises the cutting edge expertise of mymhealth and the University of Southampton and will enable us to develop predictive and personalised tools which will transform outcomes for some of our most vulnerable patients. It is vital that the revolution in digital healthcare is harnessed for all and this is the next chapter in the success of myCOPD as one of the first nationally scaled digital solutions in the NHS."

University of Southampton, Professor Michael Boniface said:

"Our research has demonstrated that machine learning can predict COPD exacerbation several days in advance. Such predictions will transform clinical models, empower patients and improve quality of life. Trust in AI and acceptance of AI supported disease management will be essential, and by engaging people living with COPD through co-design, mySmartCOPD will not only demonstrate safety and reliability but will also ensure solutions are engaging, effective and address diverse needs."

Sir Simon Stevens, chief executive of NHS England, said:

"Through our NHS AI Lab we're now backing a new generation of ground-breaking but practical solutions to some of the biggest challenges in healthcare."

Matthew Gould, chief executive of NHSX, said:

"These trials are making the AI revolution a reality for patients. Today’s award winners will push NHS AI into new areas. The possibilities are immense. This work will help ensure the NHS is a world leader in safe use of AI in health and care."

If you want to find out more about this award or how myCOPD can help your patients please get in touch here or call us on +44 (0)1202 299 583.

my mhealth awarded the Excellence in Digital Health Innovation Judges’ Choice Award 2021

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 15:05:20 GMT

The awards recognise organisations that have made outstanding contributions to their industry and are positioned to make a significant impact in the future

Since 2008, the Future Digital Awards have been awarded to tech companies at the forefront of their respective fields: companies that deliver imaginative, innovative products or services that have the potential to disrupt their ecosystems and provide significant benefits to their target audience.

This year's Judges’ Choice for Excellence in Digital Health Innovation has been awarded to my mhealth in recognition of the impact of their cutting edge technologies, including Digital Therapeutics, Telemedicine and Remote Health.

Simon Bourne, CEO and co-founder said:

“I am proud of the hard work the entire team at my mhealth has put into building our digital therapeutic platform and we’re grateful to the judges for recognising the dedication to our mission to change healthcare forever. Our platform has helped many thousands of people living with COPD, asthma, diabetes and cardiac disease, and in the last 12 months we’ve not only deployed within services across the UK but also on the island of Jersey and New Zealand. To be recognised as an innovator by the Future Digital Awards and to be counted as winners alongside the likes of Teladoc and Google is a privilege.”

Entries are initially assessed by a Juniper Research analyst panel, which then draws up a shortlist of potential winners based on a number of criteria, including:

• Product Innovation

• Features and Benefits

• Product Partnerships

• Certification & Compliance

• Future Business Prospects

These shortlists are then assessed and scored according to a rigorous set of criteria and verified by our team of experts. At the end of this process, final winners are agreed upon and confirmed by the Juniper Research judging panel.

The Judges' Choice category is not open to nominations - the winners of these categories are hand-picked by our Judges Panel and represent the very best of the best in their category.

If you’d like to find out more about the awarding my mhealth digital therapeutic platform for COPD, diabetes, asthma and cardiac disease get in touch here or call us on +44 (0)1202 299 583.

UK healthtech pioneer my mhealth announces the successful roll-out of its NHS-approved diabetes app to the Kent community

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 15:02:03 GMT

Largest ever roll-out of a diabetes digital therapeutic programme deemed a success for granting 100,000 people in Kent access to cutting-edge technology

Today my mhealth announces its successful roll-out of their NHS-approved diabetes digital therapeutic platform, myDiabetes, as 100,000 diabetes patients and their clinical services in Kent and Medway can now access the numerous health care benefits and better manage their conditions from the free app.

Since the much-anticipated launch of the roll-out in early April 2021, already over 400 patients have been given access to the myDiabetes platform, with these patients accessing more than 350 individual educational sessions. In a complete change in the way patients are able to interact with their clinician, patients are given access by their health professional and are then asked to fill in their details such as their blood glucose levels or BMI to support the delivery of the service. This will directly improve patient care by providing greater accessibility to their most important healthcare information.

With diabetes affecting around 1 in 14 people (4.8 million) in the UK1, it’s crucial that the support services bring patients and their clinician closer together while also giving patients greater control over their own healthcare. The myDiabetes app has been designed to empower patients in self-management of their condition with a user-friendly digital programme that offers quick and easy access on smart phones, tablets and computers from anywhere, at any time.

In addition, the in-app content is specifically tailored to enable patients to monitor their blood glucose, HbA1C, and other risk factors and access to an expert educational programme allows them to learn about their conditions with the aim of reducing their risk of serious long-term complications. This project will also generate a great deal of invaluable insights into the needs of the patients and how best to support them in the future.

Global Transformation Lead for my mhealth, Ian Thompson said:

"Diabetes education is a core component of a patients care. The more an individual knows about their diabetes, the more capable they are to manage their condition and the risks of developing further complications. It’s exciting for us to be working closely with multiple diabetes teams throughout the Kent & Medway area; for all of us involved we feel it is the perfect time for the NHS to bring into services that digital element of care."

Kent & Medway Diabetes & CVD Transformation and Development Manager, Ian Butcher commented:

"All of us here at the CCG alongside the Paul Carr Diabetes Trust feel this is a really fantastic step forward for people living with Diabetes in Kent. It’s important that we continue to evolve services to ensure we make the best care available. myDiabetes provides an easy-to-use digital self-management tool, with access to an educational programme, targeted evidence-based information and advice. It is designed to complement our existing diabetes services and gives all who use it digital access to tools to better manage their condition for the general improvement of their health and wellbeing."

Gary Fagg MBE, Chairman of the Paula Carr Diabetes Trust commented:

“The Paula Carr Diabetes Trust are proud to be investing in a partnership with Kent & Medway CCG and my mhealth at this very important time for the NHS. We know first-hand the challenges diabetes patients have in accessing services. Providing the diabetes digital platform, myDiabetes, offers a significant breakthrough to the continuing education and access to services for our diabetes patients across the region."

If you want to find out more about how myDiabetes can support your health service please get in touch here or call us on +44 (0)1202 299 583.

UK healthtech pioneer, my mhealth and collaborators awarded €2.5M Eurostars Grant for better heart health project

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 14:57:30 GMT

Immersive cardiac rehabilitation app, myHeart uses behavioural feedback and gamification features to improve patient well-being

The Eurostars Programme is a funding and support programme, aimed at R&D-performing SMEs that wish to redeem the benefits that come with international collaboration. The application process is hugely competitive, with 506 applications submitted from across 36 countries. The evaluation process considers three key areas for assessment; Quality, Impact and Excellence.

As the project lead, my mhealth are clinical and technological experts in digital healthcare applications for long-term conditions, with COPD as a primary area of focus. Their expertise in this arena, and vision and experience in digital therapeutics was recognised by the judging panel. In particular the project achieved the highest scores in the Innovation & R&D category.

In following strict guidelines the app will be compatible for use across the European Union, once developed the app content will be available in five languages: French, Italian, Portuguese, German and Spanish.

Dr. Simon Bourne, Chief Executive Officer of my mhealth:

“We are thrilled to be partnering with such talented and diverse teams on this innovative and important project over the next few years. Each organisation brings a very unique perspective to the table, allowing for a thoughtful and comprehensive approach to tackling heart health. I am extremely passionate about digital health and this has the potential to change many lives for the better, helping us transform cardiac rehabilitation for patients across Europe.”

About my mhealth:

Founded by two NHS medical consultants to deliver evidence-based interventions using software and applications to patients, we developed the UK’s first NHS-approved digital platform. My mhealth delivered over 275,000 rehabilitation and education sessions during 2020 to patients with respiratory and cardiac conditions.

Each of our apps, including myCOPD, myAsthma, myDiabetes and myHeart, have been developed with clinical experts in their field to provide patients with the knowledge and support to manage their conditions. These self-management apps offer a unique, customised, and personalised experience for patients and they can be accessed and used on almost any device, from smartphones to smart TV’s.

We are pioneering a new approach to dispersed healthcare provision, enabling remote monitoring, and medication management which delivers better outcomes, improved patient engagement and decreases the burden on the NHS.

About Games for Health:

Games for Health is a research & design driven SME, based in the Netherlands with over 20 years’ experience application design based on playful intelligence for healthcare and other markets. Playful intelligence allows for a desired change in behaviour among individuals, as well as larger groups as it calls on the natural youthfulness of our desire to play. Being a specialist in this field, Games for Health has designed many applications for therapy adherence, anti-biotics prescriptions in the struggle to overcome anti-biotic resistance and lifestyle change in case of infertility problems for several leading pharmaceutical companies. In several European consortia it works on motivational strategies, e.g. for stress relief of elderly employees (mHealthINX), for the stimulation of physical activities in the younger population (Sugapas) and also on planetary health related topics like environmental influence on cardiopulmonary diseases (Expanse) and reversed logistics of e-waste. It’s most recent success is the Post-IC digital diary for the prevention or relief of the post intensive care syndrome, of major importance in times of Covid-19 (Post-icu.com).

About Ospedale Malcantonese (OSCAM):

The Ospedale Malcantonese is a non-profit organisation, established in 1928 thanks to the donation of Mr. Giuseppe Rossi of Castelrotto, officially inaugurated on 11 November 1928. The Ospedale Malcantonese is included in the hospital planning of the Canton Ticino (Switzerland).

The Ospedale Malcantonese has a RAMI department (Acute Department of Minor Intensity), a psychiatry department and various outpatient services (Cardiology, Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation, Physiotherapy, Ergotherapy, Dietician, Radiology, First Aid, Psychology, Diabetology, Advice for smoke sessecion, Laboratory Analysis, Acupuncture, Abdominal and Vascular Ultrasound, Pulmonology, Social Assistance).

The Ospedale Malcantonese is represented by Dr. Tania Odello (Senior Cardiologist of the Cardiology Service and of the Rehabilitation and Preventive Cardiology Service) and the CUOREMA Cardiovascular Rehabilitation Team, from which the name of the project originates from CUOREMA . They will specialise in the clinical development of the CUOREMA App, the clinical study that will support the project and ethical supervision.

About the University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland (SUPSI):

Dr. Francesca D. Faraci is the leader of the Bio-Signal Processing (BSP) research group of the University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland (SUPSI) Department of Innovative Technologies (DTI). The research focuses on the optimisation and tailoring of advanced statistical and AI methods, to individualise clinical medicine for monitoring, diagnostic and therapeutic applications.

In the European project CUOREMA, SUPSI-DTI-BSP will be in charge of developing the bio-behavioural change support system. BSP researchers will build upon objective, subjective and contextual information about the patients; interpret the information considering the clinical and social individual characteristics and feed this information back into the system to enhance the adherence to CVR, also through gamification. Our biggest challenge is to develop algorithms that integrate different perspectives, ensuring clinical, social, psychological, technical, gamification and computational needs are taken into account.

ALFAGAMMA and L.I.F.E. sponsors

The project will benefit from the collaboration and support of the company ALFAGAMMA, distributor and manufacturer of medical devices and with the company L.I.F.E., manufacturer of advanced intelligent garments that will allow us to monitor our patients in an innovative way, even from a distance.

If you want to find out more about this project or how myHeart can help your cardiac patients please get in touch here or call us on +44 (0)1202 299 583.

How to achieve 2028 NHS England Long-Term Plan Targets for cardiac rehab

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 14:53:35 GMT

Dorset County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust Cardiac Rehabilitation team have hit the 2028 NHS targets for the past two years by adopting a new approach utilising the my mhealth app, myHeart

In 2017, the Dorset CR team and my mhealth developed an innovative CR module within myHeart to offer patients a digital component to compliment both traditional in-person and home-based models of CR delivery. The impact of utilising myHeart for CR uptake can be seen in the table below, with the services already exceeding the NHSE targets for 2028:

In March 2020, most traditional in-person CR programmes were suspended due to Covid-19. There was a rapid demand to quickly identify and adopt alternative ways of delivering CR to patients. However, the team in Dorset, due to the increased flexibility and resilience of their service model, simply suspended traditional in-person CR delivery and offered patients one of the other available options. myHeart usage increased by 124 (23.7%) patients during the first Covid-19 wave and continues to be a popular option for patients with a further 32.4% opting to use it in the first three months of year 3. These results show that digital health can contribute to supporting CR services to achieve greater patient uptake and completion rates.

Cardiac Rehab Specialist Nurse Shaun Porter told us...

"The menu-based approach of cardiac rehabilitation, has allowed us to provide an individually appropriate cardiac rehabilitation service to all of our patients, irrespective of physical conditions, ability to travel, IT literacy or socio-economic status. This, coupled with our holistic cardiac event follow-up clinic, ensures that all patients are assessed and treated promptly and holistically following their cardiac event."

The digitally enhanced approach adopted in Dorset has increased uptake to Cardiac Rehabilitation to consistently achieve and surpass the NHS targets for 2028 and increase service resilience.

"The myHeart App has proved really popular with patients and complements the other group-based and individual treatment options the rehab team offer. More cardiac patients than ever before are now receiving some form of rehab thanks to developments such as myHeart, which is having a hugely positive impact on people’s recovery and quality of life."

I f you want to find out more about how digitally enhanced cardiac rehab can help you meet the NHS England Long-Term Targets for cardiac rehab please get in touch here or call us on +44 (0)1202 299 583 .

Rebuilding the patient care backlog with digital

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 14:46:58 GMT

COVID has exposed the precarious position of local councils in the UK. Unprecedented financial strain, healthcare pressures, dwindling resources and increasing demands to meet annual targets are just a few of the issues that local councils must deal with.

DEPR: Digitally Enhanced Pulmonary Rehabilitation

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 14:45:13 GMT

In 2018, Southend University Hospital introduced myCOPD , a new menu-based pulmonary rehabilitation delivery model to provide options for patients who were unable to attend the traditional centre-based classes.

myCOPD was designed to address the challenges faced with service capacity and completion rates. The Southend DEPR (Digitally Enhanced Pulmonary Rehabilitation) model is an exemplar of innovation which has demonstrated an ability to rise to increasing service demand, maintain service delivery quality and provide resilience in the face of unforeseen events, such as COVID-19.

my mhealth aims to better connect patients in Jersey with Unlimited

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 14:01:33 GMT

The rollout of my mhealth Unlimited in Jersey follows a pilot of over 200 patients in the cardiac, respiratory and diabetes departments of Health and Community Services.

6 0% of those taking part in the trial logged into the application every day.

Use of a digital tool to support and optimise high-risk asthma patients

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 13:58:03 GMT

We’re proud to announce the my mhealth partnership with AstraZeneca to launch HAYA in the UK - an integrated oncology care management platform

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 13:56:20 GMT

Dr Adam Kirk, Clinical Director at my mhealth announces HAYA and the partnership between my mhealth and AstraZeneca

HAYA is a new integrated oncology care management platform for patients, clinicians and care centres developed in a partnership between AstraZeneca and my mhealth. HAYA enhances the delivery of care, and improve the outcomes of patients with cancer using digital health as a conduit for the remote management and monitoring of cancer therapies.

HAYA through a single interface combines telemonitoring, teleconsultation and personalised support to give patients easier access to care and to help hospitals manage resources. For patients the app enables them to remotely report their symptoms and observations directly to their clinical teams and feel empowered with an individualised set of digital tools and accessible educational material.

HAYA makes it simpler for patients and their clinical team to communicate using a combination of secure text messaging and video consultation services. These consultations are stored within the app so both the patient and clinical services can retrieve and refer to these consultations and care plans as necessary.

For healthcare professionals the application makes the entire clinical record accessible in a single secure place, incorporating the entire co-scripted record of patient symptoms, treatments, observation, test results and consultations. The clinician dashboard supports remote monitoring of symptoms and observation of patients at a population level, enabling the early identification of issues that may require intervention.

Although Initially developed for patients with lung cancer, HAYA will in the near future support the management of other cancers.

If you want to find out more about HAYA or the my mhealth platform, please get in touch here or call us on +44 (0)1202 299 583.

How to satisfy MHRA guidance on human factors and usability when designing medical apps

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 13:52:00 GMT

Chief Product Officer, Paul Cooper, gives practical advice on how to achieve Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) standards for the usability of software designed for medical devices

my mhealth build digital therapeutic apps that help thousands of patients to remotely self-manage long-term health conditions such as COPD, asthma, diabetes, heart disease and COVID-19. As a class 1 regulated medical device manufacturer, we are required by law to adhere to a user-centred design approach defined by the MHRA.

Primarily, MHRA regulations are designed to ensure that medicines and medical devices work and are acceptably safe. That means designers and developers of apps like myCOPD and COVID-19 Virtual Ward must reduce the risk of any “user errors” which could potentially cause harm to a patient. We can do that by ensuring a user-centred design process is built into the way we make software by default:

Product iteration and improvement throughout the life-cycle
Post-market vigilance and surveillance of similar devices
Human factors considerations that promote optimal clinical outcomes

Even before MHRA, my mhealth apps had been designed with the end-user in mind, whether they were apps for a nurse, doctor, clinical manager or patient, our goal has always been to build tools that people want to use. By following a user-centred design process, our software has been optimised for usability and meets the highest accessibility standards, so patients of every skill level or physical ability can benefit. And that work continues.

A recent example of the success of an iterative design process, and in particular, using formative user-testing as a method to identify risks, are improvements we made to the COVID-19 Virtual Ward app . During alpha-testing with a cohort of care home nurses, we observed an issue where some carers needed to enter patient data themselves because the patient didn't own a smartphone or computer. So, we designed a new function that enables clinicians to register patients on their behalf.

Another example of the iterative design process: during the Tees Valley NHS Vanguard Unit trials by Hartlepool & Stockton Heath GP Federation (H&SH) on the COVID-19 Virtual Ward , in-depth user-research was conducted, and usability issues were identified that resulted in a design improvement to the patient list in the clinical app. We knew that nurses were using the app to telephone patients and request their symptoms over the phone, thereby enabling the nurse to enter the data on behalf of the patients. But only when interviewing the users did we fully appreciate the real-life complications of their workload. The nurses needed a way to identify who to contact from a long list of patients. The problem caused an increase in the amount of time to make the phone calls and impacted on the nurse’s efficiency. The simple solution of indicating this type of patient and including a checkbox to mark that the results had been assessed solved this issue.

Carl Gowland Head of Operations & Service Delivery at H&SH told us:

"The COVID-19 Virtual Ward app is really straightforward to use. By working directly with my mhealth to make changes based on our clinician’s experience when testing the app, we’ve been able to work more efficiently and help more patients during the COVID-19 pandemic."

Another success story of this user-centred design process is a post-market improvement made to the medication diary.

Following usability and ethnographic research with different patient types, our research team understood that the amount and frequency of medication required for all the conditions supported by the apps varied significantly from patient to patient. Some patients took up to ten different meds every day, therefore individually re-entering the same medicine every day was a significant time investment.

The solution, to ask patients to enter their meds once, then enable them to tap a "copy yesterday’s meds" button, has helped thousands of patients save time, and reduce the risk of error significantly.

These are just a few examples of how my mhealth have successfully followed a user-centred design approach within a formative and summative assessment research model to make patients and clinicians lives easier and less prone to risk.

If you're interested in hearing more about how we've shaped our design process to conform to the "MHRA Human Factors and Usability Engineering Guidance for Medical Devices", or would like to license our software to help your patients please get in touch here or call us on +44 (0)1202 299 583 .

Digital therapy for anxiety using mindfulness treatments in virtual reality (VR)

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 12:57:50 GMT

How my mhealth, Bournemouth University and Innovate UK joined forces to tackle mental health with a VR app

At my mhealth we strive to improve the health and quality of life of people and see technological innovation as an exciting vehicle to achieve this. Our teams of doctors and technologists are constantly looking for new treatments and technologies to help meet our ambitions, be it self-management, education, rehabilitation, interventions or therapeutics. And not just for the few, we want to do this at scale, so everyone gets the chance to benefit

This is what my mhealth is all about.

We've done it for COPD, we've done it for asthma, diabetes and heart disease. And now we've done it for mental health.

The prevalence of anxiety disorders across the world varies from 2.5 to 7 per cent by country. Globally an estimated 284 million people experienced an anxiety disorder in 2017, making it the most prevalent mental health or neurodevelopmental disorder (1).

Mental health is without a doubt an illness that can be significantly improved using digital therapeutics such as virtual reality, and global investment in digital therapeutics is higher for psychiatry than any other type of illness.

That's why in 2019 we invested in a study to understand the effectiveness of virtual reality therapy for anxiety-related mental health conditions. In a collaborative partnership with Bournemouth University and Innovate UK, Robert Farthing, our VR developer, has built a digital therapy using immersive VR as a treatment for anxiety.

Rob Farthing, the principal developer told us:

"Over the past few months, there has been much discussion of mental health, so this project feels more relevant than ever, having the potential to help people who are isolated through creating a means of teaching mindfulness to manage stress and anxiety digitally. During the lock-down, we are seeing increases in adoption of technology to stay connected; there are also ongoing studies into how VR in particular is helping to address the psychological effects of global quarantines through travelling to relaxing virtual locations."

The digital therapy treats patients using existing cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) and mindful meditation techniques and is designed to complement rather than fully replace traditional therapy delivered by a therapist.

The VR mindfulness app enables people to focus on relaxation techniques without the distractions of the outside world. The immersion offered by virtual reality gives people a sense of 'presence' in a 3D computer-generated world, helping them to practice mindfulness in a controlled manner.

Handheld controllers connected to the VR headset, or the headset itself, track the user's motions during exercise, meditation and breathing exercises and patients can see a representation of themselves in the world we've created. Patients can even go as far as interacting with the landscape. For example, picking up a flower and focusing on the petals, changing the colour of their petals one by one. Or strolling through the virtual landscapes.

We're very excited to see the outcomes of the first real-world trials and to develop the VR software further. With the cost of VR headsets falling, and VR technology advancing rapidly, the cost and speed of delivering this type of therapy via VR will be more efficient than traditional methods. We envisage that therapists will loan patients the VR headsets with our software pre-loaded to complete their treatment in the comfort of their own homes.

1. Mental Health by Hannah Ritchie and Max Roser, 2018.

If you'd like to find out more about digital therapeutics or want to know more about how we can help you or your patients get in touch here or call us on 0044 (0)1202 299 583.

What is the role of a Digital Health Adviser?

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 12:29:14 GMT

How to make digital transformation work and increase engagement with digital technology

my mhealth is a clinically led software company that develops and deploys apps which help patients and clinicians to manage long-term conditions better. Since our launch we have worked collaboratively with 100s of CCGs, NHS Acute Trusts, GP practices and community providers to digitally transform the way they provide care and interact with individuals with long-term conditions.

Through this process we have developed a great insight into how to make digital transformation work and remove some of the barriers which can prevent uptake of and engagement with digital technology.

One of the most impactful interventions is the development of a new Digital Health Adviser ( DHA ) role.

A DHA is typically a non-clinical member of staff who is trained by the my mhealth digital transformation team to work with both clinicians and patients to improve uptake and engagement with our apps.

The role of a DHA can include:

Supporting the process of patient identification and enrolment

Following up patients, troubleshooting any problems they may have and signposting them to the most relevant parts of the self-management platform

Supporting clinicians to optimally use the platform - helping them to remotely monitor and manage their patients

We have seen an amazing impact from DHAs:

100% increase in the rate of uptake of our Apps
95% conversion of patient registrations into regular active users

We asked Bex, our DHA for the Mid and South Essex STP to share some of her experience of the role and its impact:

What first interested you about the DHA role and made you want to join my mhealth?

"I have worked in the NHS for 16+ years, I was first introduced to Digital Health as a clinical manager when myCOPD was rolled out within our community respiratory service.

At the time I had always thought we needed something different than the paper sheets and questionnaires that would be supplied to patients.

After the introduction to digital health through myCOPD I became excited about the progression of digital and was always on hand to help patients with set up and questions should they arise.

When Covid hit I could see the clinical teams scrambling to find an alternative to face to face care and instantly the barriers to digital were removed, clinicians who previously were not too keen, started to encourage patients to perform their pulmonary rehab via the app and patients who had once not had smart phones or the internet acquired them to keep in contact with family.

I always wanted to explore more about digital and when this new role appeared at my mhealth. I instantly applied, and here I am today helping patients manage and monitor their long-term conditions and loving every minute of it."

What is your biggest achievement as a DHA?

"I would say my biggest achievement to date is seeing the impact my role is having within a service, I recently worked with a community provider that had onboarded 231 diabetes patients but due to staffing constraints they had been unable to follow these patients up as fast as they have liked.

I identified that 127 of the 231 patients had activated their app so far, I proceeded to send out 90 re-activations. I also identified that only 11 of the patients had completed their education, so I sent out 121 in app messages with prompts for education and how to get the best out of their app, to date I have seen the following improvements:

Activation has gone from 127 to 140, a 10.2% increase within 48 hours of re-activation sent.
38 patients have logged on to the app within 48 hours of contact.
The number of educational videos watched in 48 hours has doubled!
For me this has been amazing. I have always been passionate about working with patients to manage their long-term conditions and this has shown me that if I do this with every provider, I can help patients to use digital technologies at massive scale."

If you're an existing customer and would like to discuss the Digital Health Adviser role and how it could help your service and your patients to get more out of the my mhealth platform or you're a healthcare professional or clinician and want to know more about how my mhealth can help your patients, you can find out more at www.mymhealth.com or by calling my mhealth on 0044 (0)1202 299 583

my mhealth release new instant, on-demand pop-up virtual ward service to manage and monitor patients with diagnosed or suspected COVID-19

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 09:58:00 GMT

Available to license directly from my mhealth or from the CCS Spark DPS, COVID-19 Virtual Ward is already helping people across the UK

With the possibility that further waves of COVID-19 will cause yet more disruption to the health service, my mhealth have enhanced their COVID-19 virtual ward app. This new product combines an upgraded app with a wraparound support package, that enables clinical teams to open a virtual ward within 48 hours to safely manage and monitor patients with COVID-19 at home, or in a care home.

The patient is given access to an app that can be used on almost any device (smartphone, tablet, or computer) which records their symptoms as well as observations from a pulse oximeter, twice a day. The app instantly provides patients and their care team with messages/alerts aligned to the new NHS England COVID-19 Remote Monitoring Guidelines

The COVID-19 Virtual Ward comes with a full customer support program for both the clinical site and the patient. Not only have we further refined the application to meet the needs of clinical teams and patients, but we have also streamlined our deployment processes meaning a COVID-19 Virtual Ward can be set up and ready to receive patients within 48 hours, guaranteed. Each patient is supplied with a pulse oximeter directly from us within 24 hours, and we facilitate the admission by assisting patients in using the app and the pulse-oximeter. Patients can be discharged from the ward at any time, and a copy of their stay can now be exported to the clinical record.

On contract signature we will work with clinical teams, local information and clinical governance leads to get all of the approvals, training and permissions in place, so when NHS providers need to activate the ward, all of these processes are covered, reducing the risk of any unnecessary delays.

"This new product is a game-changer for the safe remote management of patients with COVID-19, and combined with our integrated long-term condition platform can optimise patients most at risk during their virtual stay"

COVID-19 Virtual Wards are set up for a one-off fixed fee and can be activated at any time over a 3-year period. The cost includes site setup, training, and the postage/distribution of a pulse oximeter for each patient.

Pulmonary Rehabilitation Centres adopt myCOPD to deliver rehab service remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 09:51:51 GMT

Clinical Engagement Specialist Jane Stokes on innovation in the face of adversity: Digitally Enhanced Pulmonary Rehabilitation

They say that necessity is the mother of adoption, which certainly appears to be true in the world of digital health. Recent unprecedented events have resulted in the suspension of all face to face pulmonary rehabilitation services and an almost complete cessation of COPD outpatient clinics. Out of the adversity, health care services have realised that it is essential to continue to support patients with COPD to avoid deterioration and an increase in COPD emergency admissions. This has led to far greater adoption of the myCOPD platform. my mhealth have worked to support services with existing access, as well as initiating access to the myCOPD platform to support those not previously engaged. In a very short space of time services have overcome traditional barriers to adoption, adapted delivery pathways, and are already realising the benefits that digital enhancement presents.

myCOPD is a patient self-management platform referenced within the Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD 2020) guidelines, the British Thoracic Society (BTS) resource pack for Pulmonary Rehabilitation, and NICE guidelines for COPD to support patient self-management and the delivery of pulmonary rehabilitation. Over 50% of health care providers in NHS England (NHSE) gained access to the myCOPD platform through the NHSE Innovation and Technology Tariff (ITT 2017/19). I have been working with services to embed the myCOPD platform with varying levels of success. There are some common themes of resistance: the ‘not invented here’ culture; making assumptions on digital capability, accessibility and appetite with the ‘not for our patients’ response; there is also a perceived threat to resources (time, jobs). However, many services have thrived with digital transformation leading to some truly innovative models of care. In 2018 an Enhanced PR programme was launched in Southend utilising myCOPD, offering a flexible approach to pulmonary rehabilitation delivery allowing patients to complete either centre- or home-based rehab or a combination of the two.

Review of progress at the end of year one showed improved completion rates, a doubling of service capacity whilst maintaining the same outcomes for patients in both exercise capacity and quality of life scores.

No one could have predicted that we would be in a position whereby all face to face pulmonary rehabilitation would be suspended, but in response to the current situation, my mhealth have worked to support those areas with existing access to myCOPD, sharing models of best practice to support service delivery and patient care. The decision was also taken to widen the opportunity to support the delivery of pulmonary rehabilitation by offering access to myCOPD to pulmonary rehabilitation services for 3 months, at no cost to the service or patients. Already 21 new sites expressed an interest and 19 of those sites have since been set up, trained and are issuing licences to their patients.

The current pandemic has resulted in a remarkable transformation in the way we have delivered services to our patients. These skills, from remote video consultations, working collaboratively with colleagues using teams and embedding new digital tools into our normal working days has made us realise the benefits that digitally-enabled healthcare can bring to our clinical services.

If you're a healthcare professional or clinician and want to know more about how myCOPD can help your patients, you can find out more at www.mymhealth.com or by calling my mhealth on 0044 (0)1202 299 583

my mhealth’s COVID-19 Virtual Ward app receives first patients from West Hampshire

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 09:48:38 GMT

Dr Jessica Pickford knew that a digital solution was required to support her patients at scale, and not just with COVID-19

Last week, Waterside PCN became the first PCN in the UK to go live with the my mhealth COVID-19 Virtual Ward app . Waterside PCN is a group of 5 surgeries based in West Hampshire, who have started digitally transforming their patient pathway, by providing their patients with access to our entire Long-Term Condition (LTC) platform. Patients suspected to have, or diagnosed with coronavirus, will now have access to the COVID-19 Virtual Ward alongside the other apps.

The COVID-19 Virtual Ward app uses a clinically recognised scoring algorithm to assist patients being managed in a virtual environment to be cared for remotely by their clinical team. By answering questions and recording a few measurements twice a day using a pulse oximeter, the patients provide their clinical team with the information needed to monitor their symptoms remotely.

"The app has enabled us to monitor patients safely at home who we otherwise would have either needed to bring back daily for saturation monitoring or would have required admission."

The Waterside PCN team provided patients with access to a pulse oximeter, enabling them to accurately measure their oxygen levels and add their results to the Covid-19 virtual ward.

We asked Dr Jessica Pickford , of the Red and Green Practice, to tell us how the app is helping her patients. She told us:

"The Waterside PCN has been itching to get going with the LTC apps since we discovered them towards the tail end of last year. The final trigger was the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent development of the COVID-19 Virtual Ward app. The combination of these apps provided an instant set of solutions to an acute and unprecedented set of complex problems not seen on this scale in primary care before."

With the nation in lockdown, how were we going to provide the same level of care and monitoring to our patients with LTCs? The very people who are deemed most vulnerable and in most need of regular health provision now find themselves in the position of being put at risk by just coming to the surgery. Of course, the other, more acutely worrying dilemma was how were we to effectively monitor those patients in the community with potential COVID-19 infection?

We know from the evidence coming out of China and Italy that people with COVID-19 can show quite mild symptoms one day and then be very unwell requiring hospitalisation within 48hours. One of the earliest signs of deterioration is a drop in their oxygen saturations which is often not associated, at least initially, with a worsening of symptoms. How were we going to keep patients at home that could be following this path? The solution came with the COVID-19 Virtual Ward app.  Following remote telephone triage, the practices within the network can issue patients with potential COVID-19 symptoms pulse oximeter and a thermometer. These are then collected from the hot site by a family member or friend. This enables the patient to input their observations into the COVID-19 app and score their symptoms. Algorithms within the app then presents relevant alerts and advice to the patient and present this within a dashboard that can be visualised remotely from the hot hub.

"The app has enabled us to monitor patients safely at home who we otherwise would have either needed to bring back to the hot hub daily for saturation monitoring or would have required admission. It also allows us to react quickly to those patients who are showing the early signs of deterioration but who would otherwise not seek help."

We have been able to utilise the long-term apps alongside the COVID-19 Virtual Ward app in several ways. Firstly, that people with diabetes are at increased risk of hyperglycaemia and Diabetes Ketoacidosis (DKA) with COVID-19. Combining the myDiabetes app with the COVID-19 Virtual Ward app assists the GP in monitoring people with diabetes who develop COVID-19 closely and again enables them to react quickly and admit the patient if needed.

Secondly, with regards to patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and asthma, it can be difficult to determine if their symptoms are just due to an exacerbation of their LTC or if it is the early signs of COVID-19. By combining the two apps we can safely monitor observations and symptoms for the potential of COVID-19 whilst assisting with the management of their LTC.

We have been very clear to patients that they are to not rely on the clinician monitoring the dashboard but should note the prompts generated by the apps and react accordingly. We promote the persons ’ownership’ of their LTC and the apps are a perfect platform for this. They are full of self-help videos, education and self-management opportunities.  The dashboard gives the clinician a very quick and simple overview of the patient data within the individual apps enabling quick decisions and support. 

Aside from COVID-19, the LTC apps provide us with a solution to the issue of maintaining LTC support and advice whilst working in a remote environment. Our patients have found the apps very simple to set up. Patients of all ages are utilising them with ease and are excited to use them. Our diabetes, asthma and COPD nurses can also benefit from having our patients use these apps. Not only do the apps assist with the accumulation of data remotely, but they also improve the patient's engagement, insight and management of their own health, and save us significant amounts of time trying to collate all the relevant information for the yearly reviews and QOF. The apps are revolutionising our way of working and improving our patient care."

my mhealth develop coronavirus app for NHS to support patients remotely

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 09:45:54 GMT

COVID-19 Virtual Ward app: a remote coronavirus monitoring service giving clinicians a 360-degree view of patients symptoms.

C OVID-19 Virtual Ward is for patients suspected to have or diagnosed with coronavirus. By answering a few questions and recording a few measurements twice a day - cough, wellness, breathing, pulse, temperature and oxygen levels (using an oximeter) - the app uses a clinically recognised scoring algorithm to assist patients being managed in a virtual environment to be cared for remotely by their clinical team.

The app works in parallel with all four apps in the my mhealth eco-system - myCOPD, myAsthma, myDiabetes and myHeart - making it the only coronavirus app in the world that supports patients with co-morbidities.

Clinical teams can monitor hundreds of patients remotely and intervene when necessary, taking pressure off front-line services.

Dr Simon Bourne, founder and CEO of my mhealth and the principal designer of the app talks about the benefits the new COVID-19 Virtual Ward brings to clinicians and patients: "As clinicians ourselves we have experienced first-hand the enormous resource impact that the current pandemic is having at all levels of care. In response to a request from NHS clinicians and providers, we have built a simple yet powerful bolt-on to the current my mhealth platform that will enable a safe, cost-effective, immediately deployable solution to managing the many 1000s of patients that need to be monitored outside of the conventional setting."

The patient dashboard displays all the patients under a clinician's care, their current symptoms, oxygen saturation, pulse rate and wellness.

The patient's profile allows clinical teams to track their patient's symptoms and physiology over time, making it easy to see changes and to decide when a patient needs extra support.

With all the latest official coronavirus advice from the UK governments Chief Medical Officer and Chief Science Officer, the COVID-19 Virtual Ward app has been heralded as an essential tool in the NHS arsenal for fighting coronavirus and supporting the population at scale. Dr Bourne explained why, "In a time when we are all having to run clinical services remotely, there is a realisation that to manage patients at a population scale we need to harness the same devices for healthcare services and monitoring, that many of our patients are already using to manage their day to day lives. Technology has the power to free up clinical resources to enable us to prioritise care for the most vulnerable in the community".

Dr Bourne has invited clinical commissioning groups to join forces with my health, saying "We can help clinical teams to get up and running within 48 hours, please contact us today and we can support, train and activate your teams remotely to start admitting patients to the virtual ward within hours".

If you're a healthcare professional or clinician and want to know more about how COVID-19 Virtual Ward can help your patients, you can find out more at www.mymhealth.com or by calling my mhealth on 0044 (0)1202 299 583

my mhealth partner with Breezometer to provide hyper-local air quality forecasts for patients with COPD, Asthma, Diabetes and Heart Disease

Thu, 25 Jul 2024 09:39:57 GMT

Hyper-local air quality forecasts are important to patients with long-term conditions, Dr Simon Bourne explains why.

In March 2020, my mhealth released a ground-breaking hyper-local air quality forecast feature in their apps for patients. Partnering with BreezoMeter , the only company in the world who's forecasts are externally validated for accuracy and are recognised as the industry standard for real-time, location-based, outdoor air quality data, the new release is available to all existing and new users.

Leveraging BreezoMeter's Global Air Quality Index (AQI), my mhealth offer patients detailed air quality forecasts, so they know what’s in their air, exactly where they are, and understand how it affects their condition.

myCOPD and myAsthma now provide air quality information at the level of a few steps away

With actionable, personal recommendations based on individual sensitivities, and at a resolution of 5 metres - the equivalent of just a few steps - Asthma and COPD patients will be able to make informed decisions about their day-to-day activity and will be better prepared to manage their condition.

But what is the impact of poor air quality? All of us know that air pollution is bad for us, but few of us understand the true scale of impact.

Official statistics from the World Health Organisation state that 92% of us live in areas where air pollution exceeds the guidelines considered to be safe, 9/10 people breathe polluted air each day, and that 4.2 million premature deaths occur each year as a result of exposure to air pollution.

Prolonged and even short-term exposure can particularly harm sensitive groups with pre-existing respiratory or cardiovascular conditions, the elderly, children, and pregnant women, however, the stark reality is air pollution exposure affects our bodies from head to toe - research has found air pollution to be linked to cancer, asthma, strokes, dementia and more.

Ran Korber, CEO of Breezometer told us:

"Today, all of our environmental engineers understand the connection between our health and the environment and refuse to compromise when it comes to accuracy around air quality & helping people to manage exposure. After all, we each breathe 3000 gallons of air a day."

BreezoMeter adopts an innovative approach to air quality data reporting. They combine data from multiple data sources, which includes more than 47,000 sensors worldwide, meteorological data, satellites, weather, fire and sandstorm events, and live traffic information. This unique approach means they're able to collect information even when one source becomes unavailable.

They calculate air pollution in 440 million geographical points around the world and validate and organize more than 1.8 TB of data each hour. They deploy 35 different algorithms, machine-learning and sophisticated modelling to calculate 7.5 billion pollutant concentrations in high accuracy on an hourly basis. The end result is real-time air quality information that is accurate down to a hyper-local scale of 0.3 Miles (500 Meters).

Dr Simon Bourne, CEO and founder of my mhealth goes into more detail about the importance of hyper-local air quality forecasts for patients, "There has been a rapidly evolving evidence base that links poor air quality to worse outcomes for a patient with long-term conditions. We have partnered with BreezoMeter to provide our patients with access to the very best in local air quality information, right down to the type of pollution so our patients can make an informed choice about how they plan their day. There is currently no other long-term condition platform that delivers this information, with this accuracy and in such detail".

Dr Bourne has big plans for the new air quality feature in the apps, with detailed pollution forecasts helping thousands of more patients when my mhealth expand overseas into territories such as The USA, Australia and New Zealand.

"Another reason why this implementation is so important is that we have near-term plan plans to expand our business overseas this year. This partnership will enable us to deliver the same accuracy of forecasting wherever you are in the world"

If you're a healthcare professional or clinician and want to know more about how hyper-local air pollution forecasting can help your asthma and COPD patients, or if you're living with one of these conditions and would like to benefit from the new feature in the myCOPD and myAsthma apps, you can find out more at www.mymhealth.com or by calling my mhealth on 0044 (0)1202 299 583

Enhanced home-based pulmonary rehabilitation myCOPD evaluation

Thu, 13 Jun 2024 15:30:21 GMT

Enhanced home-based pulmonary rehabilitation myCOPD evaluation

Results of a service evaluation by Southend University Hospital using myCOPD to support a home-based pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) programme in several different local locations.

The Enhanced Pulmonary Rehabilitation Programme was launched by Southend University Hospital in 2018. The programme was designed to offer a variety of options for patients to complete their PR. This was a new model of care offered to patients who were unable to attend or were waiting for a centre-based course. This provided these patients with an opportunity to undertake an education and exercise course at home, supported by the PR team.

The home-based PR programme recruited 88 patients to the evaluation. 59 of the 88 home-based PR patients chose to include myCOPD , of which 15 (17%) used myCOPD only and 44 (50%) used it in combination with written information and a DVD. The remaining 29 home-based patients did not wish to include myCOPD in their PR programme and were therefore provided with either written information or a DVD.

Home-based completion rates showed that 31 (52.5 %) of the 59 patients using myCOPD at home completed the full PR programme in comparison to 7 (24.1%) of 29 who did not include the app. The COPD Assessment Test (CAT) was used as an outcome measure to explore the impact of the app for those at home. Results showed that all home-based groups saw an improvement in CAT score, however the greatest improvement overall was in the myCOPD alone group with a -3.7 point reduction. CAT score reduction across other groups ranged from -3.6 to -1.9.

Despite small differences observed in CAT score between groups, there was a more than a 100% higher completion rate of the full PR programme in those using myCOPD compared to those who did not.

The app has a structured PR programme for patients to follow at a time that suits them demonstrating the apps diverse capability. In-app notifications can be sent to remind patients to complete their PR programme and clinicians can monitor their progress.

This evaluation supports the significant impact that the myCOPD app can provide to support patients and healthcare service delivery remotely and at scale across different locations. The evaluation also supports the findings from the much larger Trooper Study published in bmj.com.

Online versus face-to-face pulmonary rehabilitation for patients with COPD: randomised controlled trial

dev.ops@mymhealth.com (Dev Ops) — Thu, 13 Jun 2024 15:25:32 GMT

Trooper Study (MMH-R01) published in BMJ Open on 17 July 2017

Simon Bourne 1,2 Ruth DeVos 1,2 Malcolm North 2 Anoop Chauhan 1 Ben Green 1 Thomas Brown 1 Victoria Cornelius 3 Tom Wilkinson 2,4

Portsmouth Hospitals NHS Trust, Portsmouth, UK
my mhealth Ltd Bournemouth, UK
Imperial College, London, UK
Clinical and Experimental Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK

First publication of complete results shows a 6-week programme of online supported pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) was non-inferior to a conventional model delivered in face-to-face sessions. This study was a non-inferiority randomised control trial to compare the outcomes of an online PR programme versus conventional face to face PR, in improving physical performance and symptoms in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

This study was a two-arm parallel single-blind, randomised controlled trial, the online arm used the online PR programme to perform PR in their own homes and the face to face arm, received conventional face to face rehabilitation in a local facility.

90 patients referred for PR, with a confirmed diagnosis of COPD and a modified Medical Research Council (MRC) score of 2 or greater were enrolled into the study. Patients were randomised, in a 2:1 ratio to receive online PR using myCOPD and 26 received conventional face to face PR. The main outcomes measured were 6-minute walk distance test and the COPD assessment test (CAT) score at completion of the programme.

The 6-week programme of online supported PR was non-inferior to a conventional model delivered in face-to-face sessions in terms of impact on the 6-minute walk test distance and symptom scores, and was safe and well tolerated by patients.

A randomised controlled feasibility trial of E-health application supported care vs usual care after exacerbation of COPD

Thu, 13 Jun 2024 15:14:33 GMT

Rescue Study (MMH-R02) published in npj Digital Medicine on 20 October 2020

Mal North 1 Simon Bourne 1 Ben Green 2 Anoop J. Chauhan 2 Tom Brown 2 Jonathan Winter 2 Tom Jones 2 Dan Neville 2 Alison Blythin 1 4, 5 Matthew Johnson 4 David Culliford 4 Jack Elkes 3 Victoria Cornelius 3 Tom M. A. Wilkinson 1, 2, 5

my mhealth Ltd Bournemouth, UK
Portsmouth Hospitals NHS Trust, Portsmouth, UK
Imperial College, London, UK
NIHR ARC Wessex, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK
Faculty of Medicine, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK

First publication of complete results shows the myCOPD app could play an important role in supporting recovery following an exacerbation of COPD.

The results from the RESCUE trial (MMH-R02), investigating the possible impact of myCOPD in supporting the recovery of patients admitted with an exacerbation of COPD were published in NPJ Digital Medicine Journal.

Exacerbations of COPD are one of the commonest causes of admission and re-admission to hospital. The role of digital interventions to support self-management in improving outcomes is uncertain.

We conducted an open, randomised controlled trial of myCOPD in 41 COPD patients recruited following hospital admission with an acute exacerbation. Subjects were randomised to either receive usual care, including a written self-management plan (n=21), or the myCOPD app (n=20) for 90 days.

The primary efficacy outcome was recovery rate of symptoms measured by COPD Assessment Test (CAT) score. Exacerbations, readmission, inhaler technique quality of life and patient activation (PAM) scores were also captured.

Results showed the app was acceptable in this care setting and was used by 17 of the 21 patients with sustained use over the study period. The treatment effect on CAT score was 4.49 (95% CI: -8.41, -0.58) points lower in the myCOPD arm.

Patients’ inhaler technique improved in the digital intervention arm (101 improving to 20 critical errors) compared to usual care (100 to 72 errors).

Exacerbations tended to be less frequent in the digital arm compared to usual care; 34 vs 18 events. Hospital re-admissions risk was 30 numerically lower in the digital intervention arm: OR for readmission 0.383 (95%CI 0.074, 1.987; 31 n=35).

In this feasibility study of the digital self-management platform myCOPD, the app has proven acceptable. Its use has improved exacerbation recovery rates, with strong signals of lower re-exacerbation and re-admission rates over 90 days. myCOPD reduced the number of critical errors in inhaler technique compared to usual care with written self-management. This provides a strong basis for further exploration of the use of app interventions in the context of recently hospitalised patients with COPD.

Evidence generation for the clinical impact of myCOPD in patients with mild, moderate and newly diagnosed COPD: a randomised controlled trial

Thu, 13 Jun 2024 15:04:59 GMT

Early Study (MMH-R03) published in ersjournals.com on 26 October 2020

Michael Crooks 1 Jack Elkes 2 William Storrar 3 Kay Roy 4 Mal North 5 Alison Blythin 5 Alastair Watson 6 Victoria Cornelius 2 Tom M.A. Wilkinson 5, 6

Hull York Medical School, Hull, UK
Imperial College London, London, UK
Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust – Basingstoke Hospital, Basingstoke, UK
West Hertfordshire Hospital NHS Trust – Hemel Hempstead Hospital, Hemel Hempstead, UK
mymhealth Limited, Bournemouth, UK
University of Southampton Faculty of Medicine, Southampton, UK

First publication of complete results for a preliminary trial of a self-management intervention using a scalable app ( myCOPD) demonstrated signals of potential clinical benefit in a population of patients with mild-moderate and newly diagnosed COPD over a 90 day period.

The results from the EARLY trial (MMH-R03), funded by an UKRI Innovate UK Grant to my mhealth were published in ersjournals.com.

Self-management interventions in COPD aim to improve patients’ knowledge, skills and confidence to make correct decisions, leading to an improvement in health status and outcomes. myCOPD is a web-based self-management app known to improve inhaler use and exercise capacity in individuals with more severe COPD.

We explored its impact in patients with mild-moderate or recently diagnosed COPD through a 12-week, open-label, parallel-group, randomised-controlled trial of myCOPD compared with usual care. The co-primary outcomes were between group differences in mean COPD assessment test (CAT) score at 90 days and critical inhaler errors. Key secondary outcomes were app usage and patient activation measurement (PAM) score.

60 patients were randomized overall (29 myCOPD, 31 usual care). Groups were balanced for FEV1% predicted, but baseline imbalance between groups for exacerbation frequency and CAT score. There was a trend to lower CAT scores in the myCOPD arm, but due to the size of the study there was no significant adjusted mean difference in CAT score at study completion, -1.27 (95% CI -4.47 to 1.92, p=0.44) lower in myCOPD. However, increasing app use was associated with greater CAT score improvement. The odds of ≥1 critical inhaler error was much lower in the myCOPD arm (adjusted odds ratio of 0.30 (0.09; 1.06, p=0.061)). The adjusted odds ratio for being in a higher PAM level at 90 days was 1.65 (0.46; 5.85) in favour of myCOPD.

The small sample size and phenotypic difference between groups limited our ability to demonstrate statistically significant evidence of benefit beyond inhaler technique, this confirms the finding from previous studies that myCOPD can reduce inhaler technique errors by >70%. The findings of this study will now be used to power a much larger RCT to investigate the impact of myCOPD in this patient population.

myCOPD: Can a digital self-management platform with a data repository support the Dorset COPD patient population and service delivery? (ID 318)

Thu, 13 Jun 2024 14:09:56 GMT

Evaluation MMH-E06 published in Published on PCRS website November 2021

O’Sullivan C 1 Stokes J 2 Blythin A 2 Dr. Kirk A 2 Dr. Ellison P 3

Marine and Oakridge Surgeries, South Coast Medical Group, Dorset
my mhealth Limited, Bournemouth
Dorset Intelligence & Insight Service, Our Dorset – Digital

‘Our Digital Dorset’ and ‘my mhealth’ conducted a study exploring the usage of myCOPD by tracking activity using the Dorset Intelligence and Insight Service (DiiS).

Results showed positive uptake and usage with myCOPD, demonstrating improvement in CAT scores. Socioeconomic factors did not appear to negatively influence app activation.

myCOPD supports the remote monitoring of patients with COPD. App activity and changes in CAT score were visible to clinicians through DiiS, contributing to a positive population health management approach.

Prediction of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Exacerbation Events by Using Patient Self-reported Data in a Digital Health App: Statistical Evaluation and Machine Learning Approach

Thu, 13 Jun 2024 13:52:45 GMT

Francis P Chmiel 1 MSc, DPhil; Dan K Burns 1 MSc, PhD; John Brian Pickering 1 DPhil; Alison Blythin 2 MRES; Thomas MA Wilkinson 2,3,4* PhD; Michael J Boniface 1* BEng

School of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton , Southampton , GB
my mHealth Limited, Bournemouth , GB
National Institute for Health Research Applied Research Collaboration Wessex, University of Southampton , Southampton , GB
National Institute for Health Research Applied Research Collaboration Wessex, University of Southampton , Southampton , GB

Results from the my mhealth and University of Southampton collaborative grant project through Big Medilytics have been published in JMIR Medication Informatics.

©Francis P Chmiel, Dan K Burns, John Brian Pickering, Alison Blythin, Thomas MA Wilkinson, Michael J Boniface. Originally published in JMIR Medical Informatics, https://medinform.jmir.org/2022/3/e26499

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work, first published in JMIR Medical Informatics, is properly cited. The complete bibliographic information, a link to the original publication on https://medinform.jmir.org/ , as well as this copyright and license information must be included.

Exploring the Validity of GOLD 2023 Guidelines: Should GOLD C and D Be Combined?

Tue, 24 Oct 2023 10:18:42 GMT

R esearch MMH-R06 published in Published on Pub Med 24th October 2023

Christopher Duckworth 1 Michael J Boniface 1 Adam Kirk 2 Thomas M A Wilkinson 2 3 4

IT Innovation Centre, Digital Health and Biomedical Engineering, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK.
my mHealth Limited, London, UK.
National Institute for Health Research Applied Research Collaboration Wessex, University of Southampton , Southampton , GB
Faculty of Medicine, University of Southampton, Southampton , GB

Introduction: The GOLD (Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease) 2023 guidelines proposed important changes to the stratification of disease severity using the "ABCD" assessment tool. The highest risk groups "C" and "D" were combined into a single category "E" based on exacerbation history, no longer considering symptomology.

Purpose: We quantify the differential disease progression of individuals initially stratified by the GOLD 2022 "ABCD" scheme to evaluate these proposed changes.

Digital healthcare in COPD management: a narrative review on the advantages, pitfalls, and need for further research .

Wed, 02 Mar 2022 14:40:35 GMT

External Studies published in Published on NCBI 2 March 2022

Alastair Watson 1 Tom M.A. Wilkinson 2

Clinical and Experimental Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, University of Southampton, Southampton, UKNIHR Southampton Biomedical Research Centre, University Hospital Southampton, Southampton, UK College of Medical and Dental Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK.
Clinical and Experimental Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, University of Southampton, Southampton. NIHR Southampton Biomedical Research Centre, University Hospital Southampton, Southampton, UK.

Digital health solutions may offer affordable and scalable solutions to support COPD patient education and self-management, such solutions could improve clinical outcomes and expand service reach for limited additional cost.

Permission to use received from Alastair Watson and Tom Wilkinson.

A real-world service evaluation of myCOPD

Mon, 14 Dec 2020 16:40:41 GMT

A real-world service evaluation of myCOPD

Results of a supported self-management evaluation of COPD patients by Stonehaven Medical Group and Aberdeenshire Health & Social Care Partnership (NHS Grampian).

Kris McLaughlin, Erika Skinner

Stonehaven Medical Group and Aberdeenshire Health & Social Care Partnership designed this test of change evaluation to explore the impact of myCOPD on patient self-management, exacerbations frequency, unscheduled general practice (GP) consultations and hospital admissions.

Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is a common and serious disease of the lungs. Many people in the UK suffer with the disease and it is a leading cause of hospital admissions. Preventing COPD exacerbations and promoting overall wellbeing can be achieved through supportive self-management of disease. However, successful self-management is dependent on the knowledge and skills provided to patients to give them the confidence to make the right decisions about their treatments, use of healthcare services and lifestyle choices. Digital tools can be a useful resource to support patient self-management. The myCOPD app provides structured education, pulmonary rehabilitation, inhaler videos to promote good inhaler technique as well as supportive self-management tools.

This test of change evaluation was conducted in primary care in 2019. At 5 months data was collected to review any outcomes since myCOPD was introduced. Overall, 64 patients agreed to take part with 43 agreeing to an early review. Of these 43, 23 (53.4%) patients who had been given access to myCOPD attended the interim review.

The evaluation involved measuring CAT score, inhaler technique including rescue inhaler usage, healthcare usage and hospital admissions, and patient feedback.

Results identified 4 key outcomes:

1. An overall improvement in mean CAT score of -2.1 since the start of the study

2. A mean reduction in rescue inhaler use was observed from 3.17 to 2.13, demonstrating an improvement in symptom control. There was also an overall improvement in inhaler technique, where good inhaler technique practices increased from 48 to 91%

3. There was a reduction observed in healthcare usage when comparing patient data prior to myCOPD. Overall, there were 20 (19%) less unscheduled GP appointments (reduction range of 105 to 85), and hospital admissions dropped from 6 to 0 during this time

4. Patient feedback showed that the proportion of patients who described their ability to manage exacerbations very well rose from 29 to 55%, and those who felt confident using an inhaler rose from 76 to 90%

This real-world evaluation of myCOPD provides valuable insights into the benefits of using digital health to support self-management. Recent studies have shown that myCOPD can provide patients with an alternative, or adjunct, to their COPD healthcare management. These results reinforce the evidence base from our formal RCTs (EARLY and RESCUE) which showed that using myCOPD improved inhaler technique, reduced CAT score, exacerbations and hospital admissions.

Based on these results, Stonehaven Medical Group, NHS Grampian’s Respiratory Managed Clinical Network canvassed for widespread adoption of myCOPD. This is to be commissioned by the Operation Home First Steering Group who have approved funding to enable rapid deployment of myCOPD during winter 2020/21.

qa-knowledgehub-mymhealth-com-e5c9u5w6p-v1

You said... We listened!

A randomised controlled feasibility trial of E-health application supported care vs usual care after exacerbation of COPD: The RESCUE Trial

You can read the full publication here

Digital Pulmonary Rehabilitation: What We Learned from the TROOPER Study

You can read the full publication here

myCOPD Recognised in NICE Early Value Assessments for Self Management and Pulmonary Rehabilitation

Qismet accreditation renewal until 2028

myDiabetes secures Qismet accreditation renewal until 2028

my mhealth and Patients Know Best Join Forces to Deliver Connected, Patient-Centred Digital Care

Empowering patients. Supporting clinicians.

Leeds Community Healthcare

Empowering patients living with Severe Asthma: How severe asthma services are digitally transforming patient care

Innovate to Improve; Managing Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD)

North Bristol NHS Trust- poster presented at Southmead Hospital by the Digital Health Champions for my mhealth myCOPD app, as part of the PROPEL myCOPD study.

A real-world service evaluation of myHeart

Results of a service evaluation using myHeart in a large London-based acute NHS Trust.

A real-world multi-centre service evaluation of myDiabetes.

A real-world multi-centre service evaluation of myDiabetes

my mhealth Collaborates with NHS University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust to Enhance Asthma Care

my mhealth data library

Innovate to Improve; Managing Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD).

North Bristol NHS Trust- poster presented at Southmead Hospital by the Digital Health Champions for my mhealth myCOPD app, as part of the PROPEL myCOPD study.

Exacerbation predictive modelling using real-world data from the myCOPD app.

Evaluation MMH-E08 published in Published on Heliyon 13 May 2024

Effectiveness of physical activity outcomes using a web-based Cardiac Rehabilitation application.

External Studies 5 October 2023

Effectiveness of psychological outcomes using a web-based Cardiac Rehabilitation application.

External Studies 5th October 2023

Characterising user engagement with mHealth for chronic disease self-management and impact on machine learning performance.

Research MMH-R07 published in Published on Nature 12 March 2024

Exploring the Validity of GOLD 2023 Guidelines: Should GOLD C and D Be Combined?

Research MMH-R06 published in Published on Pub Med 24th October 2023

Observing Digital Cardiac Rehabilitation using myHeart During the First Wave of COVID-19: A Real-World Multicentre Evaluation.

Published on omicsonline.org, 15 May 2023

Can digital health apps provide patients with support to promote structured diabetes education and ongoing self-management?

A real-world evaluation of myDiabetes usage. Published in SAGE journals 11 March 2022.

Standardized evaluation of the quality and persuasiveness of mobile health applications for diabetes management

Mobile health applications (MHA) have been found to be a promising technological approach to support self-management.

Understanding NICE Early Value Assessments: What do they mean for Healthcare?

By Maryam Tariq, Clinical Engagement Specialist at my mhealth

Successful Pilot Study Paves the Way for Widespread Deployment of myAsthma across NHS Cambridgeshire & Peterborough

NHS Cambridgeshire & Peterborough has chosen the myAsthma app for widespread deployment across the ICS.

my mhealth and Kent and Medway ICB extend their successful 3 year partnership to support long term condition management

Following the successful delivery of myDiabetes across Kent and Medway, which has seen over 12,000 individuals provided with access to support their ongoing self-management, my mhealth and Kent and Medway ICB have agreed on a new partnership.

PROPEL myCOPD Project Brief- Exploring the Implementation of myCOPD in NHS Respiratory Services

my mhealth Shortlisted for 'Most Improved Patient Outcomes' Award

We are delighted to have been shortlisted in the Health Tech World Award for 'Most Improved Patient Outcomes'.

The journey to 100k users- a my mhealth milestone to remember

my mhealth is proud to announce that it has reached a significant milestone of 100,000 users on its digital therapeutics platform.

UK digital therapeutic pioneer, my mhealth, has been awarded funding to accelerate the adoption of digitally enhanced respiratory care pathways

my mhealth and their NHS partners announce the national rollout of myAsthma Biologic, a digital therapeutic designed to support patients with severe asthma

Digital Health Advisers – The ‘person connection’ in Digital Health

my mhealth recognised there was a need to create person-centred digital app delivery and support which led to the development of the DHA

my mhealth announces appointment of David Pettigrew as their new CEO

Evaluation of diabetes self-management mobile health applications

Prediction of Exacerbation Events using myCOPD data

myCOPD - Positive population health management

NHSX Digital Health Partnership Award funds the adoption of both myOp and myCOPD in four NHS centres

my mhealth launches COPD app in New Zealand in partnership with Vodafone and district health board

myCOPD is the first digital self-management programme for COPD to be available in New Zealand

my mhealth and University of Southampton announced as Round 2 Winner of The Artificial Intelligence in Health and Care Award

The Artificial Intelligence in Health and Care Award aims to benefit patients by combining the power of artificial intelligence with the expertise of the NHS to improve health and care outcomes

my mhealth awarded the Excellence in Digital Health Innovation Judges’ Choice Award 2021

The awards recognise organisations that have made outstanding contributions to their industry and are positioned to make a significant impact in the future ﻿

UK healthtech pioneer my mhealth announces the successful roll-out of its NHS-approved diabetes app to the Kent community

Largest ever roll-out of a diabetes digital therapeutic programme deemed a success for granting 100,000 people in Kent access to cutting-edge technology

UK healthtech pioneer, my mhealth and collaborators awarded €2.5M Eurostars Grant for better heart health project

Immersive cardiac rehabilitation app, myHeart uses behavioural feedback and gamification features to improve patient well-being

How to achieve 2028 NHS England Long-Term Plan Targets for cardiac rehab

Dorset County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust Cardiac Rehabilitation team have hit the 2028 NHS targets for the past two years by adopting a new approach utilising the my mhealth app, myHeart

Rebuilding the patient care backlog with digital

DEPR: Digitally Enhanced Pulmonary Rehabilitation

my mhealth aims to better connect patients in Jersey with Unlimited

Use of a digital tool to support and optimise high-risk asthma patients

We’re proud to announce the my mhealth partnership with AstraZeneca to launch HAYA in the UK - an integrated oncology care management platform

Dr Adam Kirk, Clinical Director at my mhealth announces HAYA and the partnership between my mhealth and AstraZeneca

How to satisfy MHRA guidance on human factors and usability when designing medical apps

Chief Product Officer, Paul Cooper, gives practical advice on how to achieve Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) standards for the usability of software designed for medical devices

"The COVID-19 Virtual Ward app is really straightforward to use. By working directly with my mhealth to make changes based on our clinician’s experience when testing the app, we’ve been able to work more efficiently and help more patients during the COVID-19 pandemic."

The awards recognise organisations that have made outstanding contributions to their industry and are positioned to make a significant impact in the future

How my mhealth, Bournemouth University and Innovate UK joined forces to tackle mental health with a VR app