GPs are a key part of care delivery. They understand patients needs, feel the pressures facing primary care and recognise how things can be improved but until now have had little opportunity to progress these ideas.
This year five pilot sites and entrepreneurial GPs with innovative commercial ideas to support the NHS and primary care were selected to join the Royal College of General Practitioners flagship Innovators Mentorship Programme (IMP).
The selected GP entrepreneurs join the programme with early stage solution to address some of the burdens on general practice and improve the lives and care of patients.
The five GP entrepreneurs are:
Abudullah Albeyatti
Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder of Medicalchain, a health record system built using OpenEHR standards and supported and protected by blockchain technology. Medicalchain improves convenience through video telemedicine consultations where appropriate.
Catherine Millington-Sanders
Co-founder of Difficult Conversations, a AI tech tool which supports improved communication and effective care planning and/or professional feedback for professionals delivering general practice online/virtually.
Christopher Castle
Founder of GPEP - Muscle and Joint Empowerment Self-Management App, an app which delivers rehabilitation through the convenience of a smartphone. It aims to empower patients by handing them control and flexibility of their own healthcare pathway.
Stephen Katebe
Co-founder of Tekihealth Solutions Limited, a telemedicine service that will provide a home visiting service for GP practices in rural and deprived communities to help alleviate GP workload.
Thomas Adler
Founder of B4Falls, a simple and unique innovation designed to prevent accidental falls at home of the elderly. The devise is aimed at intervening just prior to a potential fall triggered by playing a pre-recorded message triggered by the person switching on their bedside light or motion sensor.
The selected pilot sites join the programme as collaborative organisations (including federations, clusters and super-partnerships or similar) who are eager to work with GP entrepreneurs as pilot sites, supporting the testing and evaluation of innovations.
The five pilot sites are:
AT Group
Pilot Site Lead: Omar Din
AT Group is a group of three organisations: AT Medics, AT tech and AT Learning. It is a leading super partnership with a history of developing innovations and rolling them out nationwide.
Medway Innovation Hub (MiH)
Pilot Site Lead: Mayur Vibhuti
MiH is an innovation hub hosted by Medway Clinical Commissioning Group. Co-founded by Sarah Leng and Mayur Vibhuti, the innovation hub has a focus on quality improvement methodology to measure change and success.
One Care (BNSSG) Ltd
Pilot Site Lead: Scott Godley
One Care (BNSSG) Ltd is a GP Federation owned by 83 practices across Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire, who together care for around one million patients.
South Westminster PCN
Pilot Site Lead: Jan Maniera
South Westminster PCN has a number of diverse practices within the PCN and has change management expertise and knowledge of medical devices. The PCN also has experience of taking new innovations to multiple sites within the PCN.
Sunderland GP Alliance
Pilot Site Lead: John Twelves
Sunderland GP Alliance is a GP Federation covering approximately 95% of patients across Sunderland. The Alliance also provides extended access services to the city’s entire 284,000 patients, organises and inputs into multi-disciplinary teams, participates in the national Clinical Pharmacy Pilot and runs Career Start schemes for GPs, practices nurses and HCAs.