Solutions4Health (S4H), is partnering with Dublin-based Kinesis Health Technologies to deliver innovative falls prevention services and technologies in the UK.
S4H are taking advantage of Kinesis’ breakthrough technology QTUG™ (which has been shown to be much more accurate than traditional methods in assessing risk of falls in older adults) and their own proven cutting edge and web-based management information systems – to facilitate large-scale adoption of the technology across the NHS.
Falls in older adults are a major problem across the UK, with one in three people over 65 (one in two people aged over 80) falling at least once a year. The number of over 65s in England alone is forecast to rise from 9 million to 11 million in 2021, while falls are estimated to cost the NHS more than £2.3 billion per year and take up four million bed days.
Such falls are also the leading cause of serious accidental injury amongst people aged 65 and over. One of the most common are hip fractures, with 30% of sufferers dying within a year. Incidence rates in hospitals are even higher, and in long-term care settings approximately 30–50% of residents fall each year.
This follows a highly successful pilot scheme where Kinesis QTUG™ is part of S4H’s unique FallsFree4Life service for Bracknell Forest Council and Slough Borough Council. The collected data are streamed wirelessly, via Bluetooth, to a touch screen tablet device that displays the calculated results of some 56 movement variables covering strength, balance and gait. Having a falls risk assessment in the home means the S4H wellness coach can also pick out hazards in the home environment, plus there is no need to travel and the service is easily accessible for local residents. See the video at https://www.solutions4health.co.uk/s4h-tv/
Kishore Sankla, our CEO, says: “We already run health innovation services for some 30 councils across the country and these strong relationships regularly expose us to the NHS Clinical Commissioning Groups and Health & Wellbeing Boards that are increasingly looking at preventive measures to improve quality of life and reduce financial costs.
“The increasingly substantial cost of falls places a massive burden on the NHS and has an equally huge personal cost, plus there are also massive downstream effects in terms of carer time and absence from work. By partnering with Kinesis we will be able to provide real benefits and efficiencies for falls prevention – giving physical therapists and other clinicians a superior method of determining an individual’s potential for falling, and providing the necessary support and information in order to intervene and greatly reduce that risk.”
Kinesis QTUG™, a Class I medical device, utilises body-worn sensors combined with signal processing and machine learning methods to provide a quantitative assessment of mobility and falls risk, plus statistical comparisons against population averages for age and gender. The technology has been scientifically validated through an extensive programme of top-tier internationally peer-reviewed research in falls prevention over the past eight years, based on over 1300 patient assessments.
Solutions4Health’s falls prevention and management information solutions provide organisations carrying out falls risk assessments with comprehensive online tools, enabling them to manage their services accurately and efficiently. As a leading service provider across the UK’s healthcare economy, Solutions4Health has many years of experience in the delivery of large scale health interventions and providing innovative technology and solutions for much improved outcomes and far lower costs.
