Innovation & Technology for Health
All Tools for Action
Innovation & Technology for Health
New innovations and technological solutions have the potential to revolutionize healthcare delivery. However, it is critical that innovations are designed with users perspectives in mind. This toolkit is created to increase your chances of creating impactful and sustainable solutions.
Innovation, in general terms, is something new or significantly improved (a product, service, process or method) that is being used/implemented and creating value to its users. Digital health innovations include all solutions managing health digitally, such as but not limited to, mobile health, health information technology, wearable devices and self-care, telehealth, distance monitoring and personalized medicine.
Innovations and new technological advancements have the potential to transform and improve many areas of the health sector and make it more sustainable in a multitude of ways. Innovative solutions can achieve positive and sustainable outcomes by effectivising processes, connecting silos, increasing accessibility, facilitating monitoring, preventing, empowering patients, spurring behavioral changes and making better use of health data - to name a few!
In short, innovations have to be designed with the users and not dropped on them. This requires greater attention to the motivations, constraints and specific contexts that influence users and patients. By following a structured innovation process, with the users as co-designers rather than passive recipients, and with implementation in mind at an early stage, we believe that you can increase your chances of creating an impactful and sustainable solution.
The Toolkit
Welcome to the Innovation Toolkit! This is a 5-step toolkit with multiple shortlisted tools (in PDF format for easy printing), useable for individual or group settings. Inspired by the NHS Sustainable Healthcare Approach this toolbox presents an innovation process with a clear focus on the user and the context.
DRIVING BETTER HEALTHCARE
This first step in the innovation process is concerned with focusing on and not losing sight of the reason for the innovation, which is to support the delivery of better healthcare to the population. To do so you have to make sure that you understand the true needs of your users. You also have to understand the context in which the innovation will be implemented.
SHORTLISTED TOOLS
1.1 Define the problem1.2 Validate needs
1.3 Map stakeholders
1.4 Analyse the context
BEHAVIORAL DE-RISKING
Now it is time to develop the concept — in close collaboration with the target users to ensure that they adopt the innovation.Understanding how people might respond to new services or technologies is embedded in psychology, social sciences and data sciences. It is important that the end user responses should be incorporated during the early stages of the design phase to address any behavioural risks that may arise after implementation.
SHORTLISTED TOOLS
2.1 Develop the concept2.2 Analyse feasibility
2.3 Plan for impact management
2.4 Investigate business and organisational model
2.5 Package the concept
MAKING THE PROCESS EXPLICIT
By now you have a pretty clear idea of your concept and it is time to test your concept in a real world environment, together with the future users. This aims at ensuring a seamless, explicit, simple and comprehensible interaction with the new technology. The people using your innovation need to be confident that with the provided guidelines, they can achieve the required outcomes. Through this step you will build a roadmap needed for a successful implementation.
SHORTLISTED TOOLS
3.1 Test and validate the concept3.2 Develop the product/service
3.3 Decide on health care integration strategies
3.4 Set up an implementation plan
Make sure to revisit your insights!
DELIVERING NEEDED EVIDENCE
It’s time to put your vision into effect! You now have a good understanding of your users, the environment in which they act and you have a plan on how to follow and evaluate impact. Use roadmaps and user insights to make sure you, your team and your contractors stay on track and tweak the solution if needed. Efforts should be continuously focused towards the right kind of change in order to achieve the ultimate purpose.
SHORTLISTED TOOLS
4.1 Facilitate implementation
4.2 Evaluate impact and improve solution
4.3 Communicate benefits in order to scale
REACHING A BROADER POPULATION
If the first implementation journey proves to be successful, you probably want to move on and spread your innovation to include a larger population and more implementation sites. You might also want to scale the potential by looking into other scenarios/settings, users or regions where your innovation could be of use.
When implementing in a new environment you might have to redo some, or all, of the steps in the innovation process, not least if moving into a new country - where completely new organisational, cultural and/or regulatory conditions might prevail. However, being able to communicate proven impact from one setting surely helps in your endeavour to scale into new contexts.
Do remember to co-create with your users to scale the potential in a new market or domain!
Want to know more?
There are many other recommended literature as references when you are digitalising the data. We have compiled a deep dive for you who like to read up more on the link below.
We wish you the best of luck digitalising your information and data!
DOWNLOAD FULL LIST OF REFERENCES
Operated by Karolinska Institutet in Sweden
and Makerere University in Uganda