Background

Devon Training Hub, part of the NHS in south-west England, wanted to transform the delivery of its care services by pioneering the use of immersive technologies.

Insight worked with caregivers in the locality to explore the potential of augmented reality and how it could enhance the services they provide in care home and domiciliary environments.

Challenge

Health and social care services face multiple challenges, including staff shortages, high staff turnover and increased demand from an ageing population.

Provision of adult social care in Torbay is delivered by 3,500 direct care colleagues. Although the vacancy rate is lower than the national average, around a third still leave their jobs each year.

Increased demand and skills-related issues puts pressure on services that enable people to get out of hospital, and help reduce admissions to hospital in the first place. And while providing home care to clients is preferrable, the resource required to deliver this effectively remains a challenge.

“What we’re doing is looking at technology and asking how can it enable people to perform better, enjoy their work more and provide even better outcomes for patients, clients and staff.”

“Thanks to Insight, the benefits of using mixed reality technology have surpassed our expectations.”

John Bryant, Integration Lead – Social Care, 
Devon Training Hub and Head of Integration and Development, Torbay Council

Solution and Outcome

Insight ran a first-of-its-kind trial to demonstrate how Microsoft’s HoloLens mixed reality solution could transform care provision in support of integrated services.

It was imperative that the end users of the technology – the caregivers – were bought into the trial and helped shape the way it was deployed.

Insight ran awareness and training sessions that enabled caregivers to get hands-on with the innovative technology and identify a range of potential use cases. Two major discoveries were made during this phase.

Firstly, if a caregiver suspected a health issue, which they were not trained to assess or diagnose, they were able to instantly connect to a more qualified/experienced member of staff using HoloLens – providing quicker assistance to the individual receiving care (the client).

Secondly, bringing registered nurses and clinicians onto a virtual call removed the need for on-site visits, significantly reducing the time to deliver the required assistance.

The use of augmented reality is transforming the way social care is delivered in the locality – reducing waiting times and improving the quality of provision.

Insight and its south-west partners have subsequently developed a network of local champions, providing them with materials, knowledge, skills and confidence to run awareness and end user training sessions.

Why Insight?

Devon Training Hub chose Insight to deliver this innovative use of immersive technology based on a 20+ year pedigree of transforming care and increasing efficiency for more than 400 NHS and care clients in the UK.

Insight combined its knowledge and experience of HoloLens in care settings with user-centric service design, end-user training and adoption and change management methodologies. This gave the trust, council, care home managers and workers confidence that the solution would make a positive impact on the services they deliver and on clients’ quality of life.

RESULTS