Why Trustech is flying the flag for healthcare innovation

The UK’s medtech sector is well supported and represented by a raft or organisations and associations. Raj Purewal, business development and partnerships director at Trustech, provides an insight into the organisation and how it is flying the flag for healthcare innovation.

Trustech is an NHS organisation that aims to improve health and care through the development of innovative products and services. We were one of the first NHS innovation service providers and have built an enviable wealth of experience in managing and developing innovation in the health and care sectors.

We work with other NHS organisations, companies, and regional, national and international bodies and networks to bring forward new ideas and help to put them into practice. Our innovation management services are available to all NHS providers and commissioners, while our consultancy service is for health and social care companies from anywhere in the world, who want to access the NHS. We also work with universities, local and national governments, local authorities and business support agencies who focus on improving delivery of patient care.

Originally created by the NHS, Trustech is still hosted by one of its biggest trusts in England; Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust. Our peerless connections to the NHS give us in-depth, and up-to-date insight into how the institutions work and how the wider NHS is planning to implement changes. With our insight, our clients trust us to give them the best possible advice on how to work with in this area.

After national funding from the Department of Health ended in 2012, many of the other regional innovation hubs altered their course and became private companies. Trustech has been able to remain as the intermediary for the NHS and the commercial world by establishing a membership model for our trusts and by developing effective innovation support services, such as the Innovation Factor, which helps to stimulate, capture and drive new staff ideas.

We deliver our support services in a number of ways, primarily through either our NHS membership services or commercial consultancy services. For the NHS, the Innovation Factor helps cultivate and capture innovation from the NHS workforce, and we provide bespoke support to them for innovative ideas. This support can include, advice on patents and protection, assistance with funding applications or research, and also relevant innovator (from industry) engagement.

We also help NHS organisations identify innovations for potential adoption and implementation, and this aids the adoption of innovative ideas across hospital and community settings to improve patient care.

For industry, we act as the access and entry point for UK, EU and global healthcare companies that are seeking to introduce their innovative products and services to the NHS. For academic and commercial clients, we help them understand how the NHS works and what it needs, identify the NHS staff they need to speak with, and facilitate in-situ evaluations of their innovations.

Our day-to-day roles are exciting as we are at the heart of change. Our team helps to qualify, develop and test new technologies, and advise on how they can be adapted or adopted for use in the NHS. The projects themselves range from technologically inventive medtech products to more unique products, such as SAGE & THYME; a training package to help staff always communicate with compassion and objectivity.

With the range of projects Trustech works on, what we do each day can vary from planning and delivering Dragons’ Den style innovation programmes for Clinical Commissioning Groups, to advising an innovative paediatric nurse on how best to develop her innovation for infants. Our goal is always the same; to improve health and care by capturing, supporting and developing innovations.

To discover how innovation can help your NHS organisation progress, or if you have an innovative idea that you would like to launch in the health and social care arena, contact Trustech on 0161 276 5764, email innovations@trustech.org.uk, visit www.trustech.org.uk and follow us on Twitter: @trustech_nhs.