Welcome to the tenth issue of Inside Medicalchain, our monthly newsletter to keep our community up to date.
If you missed the ninth issue you can catch up by clicking here.
Product Development
Want to help? Give us feedback!
Please continue to download our iOS version of MyClinic.com and let us know your feedback on version 1.0 by sending in your comments to — [email protected]
You will be excited to hear that V2 of the MyClinic.com application is almost ready for release — along with an updated MyClinic.com website — we will be sharing this with you shortly!
The new website is designed to appeal to both business and patient-users alike.
Welcome to the ninth issue of Inside Medicalchain, our monthly newsletter to keep our community up to date.
If you missed the eighth issue you can catch up by clicking here.
Product Development
Want to help? Give us feedback!
Please continue to download the iOS version of the MyClinic.com application, and let us know your feedback on version 1.0 by sending us your comments to — [email protected]
You will be excited to hear that V2 of the MyClinic.com application is almost ready for release, and we will be sharing this with you very shortly! Read more
Figures published by NHS Digital show that by 31 March 2017, the percentage of eligible women (aged 25 to 64) who were recorded as screened adequately was 72.0%. This compares with the 72.7% at 31 March 2016 and 75.4% at 31 March 2012 who were screened.
Given this decline in uptake, Public Health England has decided to launch a national cervical screening campaign in March of 2019. This is to raise more awareness around the subject of cervical cancer and known causes such as the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) and related diseases to get more women participating.
Welcome to the eighth issue of Inside Medicalchain, our monthly newsletter to keep our community up to date.
If you missed the seventh issue you can catch up by clicking here.
This edition marks the start of the new year, so from all of us at Medicalchain — we would like to wish you all a happy new year!
We look forward to the upcoming months as we will see our plans come to fruition, to be able to present the MyClinic.com 2.0 app, and also the initial release of the HealthPassport application. Read more
In the last article, I wrote about some of the issues surrounding alcohol; including fitness, calories, cancer, the brain, and even sex and reproduction. In this second part on the subject of Dry January, I will delve into five more:
Heart
The effects of alcohol on the cardiovascular system are widely researched and include the following:
Increased heart rate
Increased blood pressure
Weakened heart muscle
Irregular heartbeat
Atrial fibrillation
Coronary heart disease (CHD) is a leading result of excessive alcohol consumption and leads to many less than desirable consequences, such as heart attack and stroke. Read more
The turn of every new year brings with it a barrage of resolutions and a surplus of best-intentioned gym-goers.
The new year also has another health-related tradition, that of the “Dry January” challenges. This is a campaign designed and promoted by Alcohol Change UK to raise awareness of the effects of alcohol.
The event started back in 2004 and the idea is as the name suggests — to go alcohol-free for the full 31 days of January. This can be done in promotion of the charitable organisation or simply as an acknowledgement to your own wellbeing.
The subject of alcohol and health is quite extensive, so I’ll break this up into two parts and will try to cover the majority of the topic within these. First of all is the effects of alcohol on physical activities. Read more
William James, an American psychologist was a leading thinker of the late nineteenth century and one of the most influential U.S. philosophers. Labelled as the “Father of American psychology” he wrote back in 1890 —
“The faculty of voluntarily bringing back a wandering attention, over and over again, is the very root of judgment, character, and will.”
Social skills are formed through face-to-face interactions with others from birth, such as infants with their parents and siblings, and children with their peers at nursery and school. But there is a growing concern that the use of social media is effectively displacing the way the new generation is developing their peer to peer social skill-set throughout adolescence. The question is whether these digital stimuli have the potential to influence the risk of behavioural addiction.
University College London psychiatrist Dr Michael Bloomfield states: “Adolescence is a critical period for a person’s development, particularly as our brains go through important changes during our teenage years.”
Neuropsychiatric Disease and Treatment, which is a peer-reviewed medical journal covering research in psychiatry and neurology, released an in-depth article into the Maturation of the adolescent brain. It stated:
“It is well established that the brain undergoes a “rewiring” process that is not complete until approximately 25 years of age… The nucleus accumbens, a part of the brain’s reward system located within the limbic system, is the area that processes information related to motivation and reward. Brain imaging has shown that the nucleus accumbens is highly sensitive in adolescents, sending out impulses to act when faced with the opportunity to obtain something desirable.”
Part of the appeal for these attention-seeking businesses are the ‘rewards’ they offer; push notifications of the number of ‘likes’ on the user’s post for example. These are types of rapid reward cycles which reinforce the habit-forming actions of their users, guaranteeing they keep coming back time and time again.
An opposing opinion is that perhaps it is not the general use of digital media but more the content and context that is influential since some uses of digital technologies actually do improve multitasking skills, working memory, and fluid intelligence- which is one’s problem-solving ability.
Whether we use the technology to connect with loved ones throughout the day for that familial interaction and support, or if our usage is related entirely to our curiosity and inclination to compare our lives to the often highly filtered and sheltered lives of others, there is a stark contrast to the online environment we expose ourselves to. With the more astute and measured perspective of an adult, these potentially negative factors may not be such an ‘influence’ (as these ‘influencers’ are named). But for younger, less pragmatic users, these issues will have a much greater impact on their self-esteem and value.
A study into the issue was conducted by University at Albany psychologist, Julia Hormes. She led a team of three researchers in assessing the addictive nature of social media — specifically Facebook. She states that-
“New notifications or the latest content on your newsfeed acts as a reward. Not being able to predict when new content is posted encourages us to check back frequently,”
The big players profit from their user-base through targeted advertising which means this genuinely becomes an economy driven by control over our attention. The value of our attention is enhanced by its finite availability, thus the demand and need for those in this market to compete.
With the emergence of these critical communication technologies, there is bound to be some fraction of users who will show addictive behaviour. If someone is displaying unbalanced behavioural habits, whose responsibility is that?- It would certainly be in the platform provider’s interest to afford some safeguarding within their services since they know exactly how much you are using their product and the detrimental effect of reliance on them.
Alex Marshall CPsychol, Forensic Psychologist, provided an overview of the subject when he observed-
“There is a lot of research into adolescents being vulnerable to entrenchment in a particular lifestyle that otherwise would be adolescence-limited, but failure to integrate (amongst other factors) prolongs behaviour or steers them off onto a trajectory that they otherwise weren’t destined towards biologically or socially.”
Ultimately, nobody knows the consequences these digital media phenomena will have on modern life and to some level, we are all part of a long-term social experiment to find the answer.
Welcome to the seventh issue of Inside Medicalchain, our monthly newsletter to keep our community up to date.
If you missed the sixth issue you can catch up by clicking here.
Announcement
Medicalchain Opens New Office in Switzerland
Since its foundation, Medicalchain has been growing rapidly and we are delighted to announce the official opening of our new office in Switzerland. We have a global vision and geographical expansion is necessary to achieve this.
Product Development
MyClinic.com continues to improve and we are working to our timeline for version 2 which is eagerly anticipated for the end of Q2 2019.
We are working extra hard to confirm contracts and are hopeful that our services will be available within the NHS as well as the private sector soon.
MyClinic.com will also be available on Android very soon.
Timeline:
Considering how difficult it can be to keep up with our progress, especially product development — we have created an interactive timeline on our website to update you clearly on our road to achieving our goals.
Want to help? Give us feedback!
Please continue to download our iOS version of the MyClinic.com app and let us know your feedback on version 1.0 by sending us your comments to — [email protected]
Media
Our Communications Manager, Tim Robinson has been working on a new blog about the problems in healthcare and how to address these. Check out some of his articles below:
Faxploit: Read about the security dangers healthcare systems have by using fax machines— read here
Lifestyle Intervention: Read about how the NHS plans to help patients at risk of developing diabetes with “lifestyle interventions” to curb the demand the health service is under — read here
Curiosity killed the…Trust?: Trust is especially valuable when it comes to our intimate health data, read about how that ‘trust’ is being handled today — read here
E-Prescribing for NHS Trusts: Read about the benefits of “E-Prescribing for NHS Trusts” — read here
Youth Turning to Apps for Mental Health Needs: Read why our youth are turning to health tech and apps to care for their mental health needs instead of existing conventional options — read here
Snail Mail in the digital age: Read how using ‘Snail Mail in the digital age’ to inform patients about their vital NHS healthcare services has caused serious delays in tests and screenings for thousands of patients — read here
Events
COO Mo Tayeb presenting at the Healthcare Expo in Taiwan
Our COO, Mo Tayeb has been busy this month in Switzerland, Italy and Taiwan, speaking at various events and forums that showcase the latest in technology in healthcare. In Switzerland, he attended the Life Sciences Leader Forum. In Italy, he spoke at the Futureland event, which highlighted the companies and technologies that are going to make an impact in 2019. Finally, in Taiwan, he presented Medicalchain at the Healthcare Expo at the end of November. This event marks the principal display of solutions and connections for medicine and healthcare in Asia.
COO Mo Tayeb presenting at Futureland
Back home, Mo has been just as busy speaking in London at the Healthcare Unblocked event, the UK’s first conference dedicated to advancing blockchain in healthcare.
Medicalchain’s stand at Giant Health event
More in London this month as our Head of Business Development, Dr Amina Albeyatti attended the Giant Health Event 2018 at Stamford Bridge, home to the Chelsea Football Club. We received a warm reception and presented Medicalchain and MyClinic.com and its application in our health, to a very excited audience.
Dr Amina Albeyatti speaking at the Giant Health event
Dr Amina Albeyatti was interviewed by Disruptive Live. Check out the interview below:
We were also interviewed by Jessica DaMassa, health blogger for WTF Health.
As one of the UK’s technology startups and the first UK-based company to bring blockchain technology to healthcare, we were delighted to be invited to the 11th Annual GovNet Parliamentary Awards, hosted by Rt Hon. Baroness Golding. It was an enjoyable and relaxed evening to set off the Christmas season.
Communication Manager Tim Robinson at the House of Lords, Westminster
Upcoming Events
Our founders will be holding an AMA on December 24th at 7:30 am GMT, a link to the event on YouTube will be shared via our social media closer to the date. Please start posting your questions from now to Communications Manager, Tim Robinson. [email protected]
London January 9th 2018
Designing a Central Bank Digital Currency and Building Healthcare on Blockchain
Medicalchain’s COO, Mo Tayeb, will be speaking at this event. Find out more and how to join us
Social Media
Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to ask us questions and engage with our communications team. If you have not had the chance to say hello yet, please click on one of the links!
Don’t Forget To Sign Up For Your Free Health Passport
The Medicalchain Health Passport signup is live! Prospective patients and medical practitioners can register their interest now, by clicking here.
Next Issue
Partnerships within the NHS and private sector
New website reveal — coming soon
Special thanks
This month marks the end of an eventful year for Medicalchain. With the conceptualisation and delivery of the first rendition of the MyClinic.com application, to the plethora of events all around the world that members of the team have presented at.
We appreciate all the support we have received for what we are trying to achieve, from our loyal community members to representatives we meet at our events — including the wider public at large.
Overall this year we have represented at over 52 events in over 25 cities around the world!
We look forward to the new year and all that we have in line to achieve in keeping with our roadmap. Notably, the updated versions of the MyClinic.com application and the release of the Health Passport, which will truly enable patients to hold their own data. With more good news on the way with exciting partnerships close to being announced.
Again, we thank you for your support and wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, from all at the Medicalchain team.
Thanks for reading the seventh newsletter of Inside Medicalchain. For more information on where to purchase our tokens (MTN), click here.
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The UK’s Department for Health and Social Care has announced this week, that it will be providing £78 million to establish electronic prescribing and medicines administration (ePMA) systems in NHS Trust sites. There will be an initial share distributed to 13 selected NHS trusts, with a total of £16 million funding for 2018/2019 between them.
The reason for this decision is to move away from handwritten prescriptions which cause many issues within the system. Health Minister Stephen Hammond said, “As part of the long-term plan for the NHS, we not only want to harness technology to make it one of the most advanced healthcare systems in the world but crucially to improve patient care… The funding provided for these trusts will help to drive these changes to the patient experience, but will also aid our hard-working and dedicated staff… The introduction of electronic prescribing is not only known to reduce medication errors but also frees up time for staff by moving away from archaic systems.”
The benefits of ePMA systems include:
The reduction in potentially deadly medication errors by up to 50% when compared with the old paper systems.
The creation of a more complete electronic health record.
Dispensers can reduce use of paper, have improved stock control, and provide a more efficient service to patients.
Patients can collect repeat prescriptions from a pharmacy without visiting their GP, and won’t have a paper prescription to lose. In turn, freeing up GP time.
This is a great move to advance the UK’s health system for the benefit of service providers and patients alike.
A research body conducted by university academics from Manchester, Sheffield and York, identified more than 230 million medication errors a year that took place in the NHS. The report also stated that an estimated 712 deaths result from avoidable adverse drug reactions (ADRs). Furthermore, these ADRs could be a contributory factor to between 1,700 and 22,303 deaths a year.
Fiona Campbell, Research Fellow from the University of Sheffield’s School of Health and Related Research, said: “Measuring harm to patients from medication errors is difficult for several reasons, one being that harm can sometimes occur when medicines are used correctly, but now that we have more understanding of the number of errors that occur we have an opportunity to do more to improve NHS systems.”
A personal case in point occurred recently. On a weekend away within the UK, I became aware that I’d forgotten to bring my inhaler with me. Usually, the asthma is not a problem, but there was a lot of heavy walking and a log fire involved which seemed to exacerbate the issue.
Upon attending a local pharmacy I came to an abrupt roadblock as the pharmacist refused to sell me an inhaler over the counter, instead insisting I give her a paper copy of my prescription.
If I didn’t have my inhaler I certainly wasn’t going to have my prescription with me, so I asked if she could make a discretionary judgment as I had no means of providing the prescription and I mentioned the NHS website, which says:
“If you urgently need medication, contact your prescriber immediately to arrange a prescription. If this isn’t possible, you may be able to get medicine from a pharmacist in an emergency, subject to certain conditions.”
This is when she also quoted the NHS website and relayed to me:
“You must have been prescribed the medicine before by a doctor, dentist, nurse independent prescriber, optometrist independent prescriber or other healthcare professional, who is registered in the UK.”
Here was the alleged issue – I had no evidence that I had been prescribed Salbutamol previously, other than knowing what it is and wheezing at her over the counter.
The next step was to call up my home GP and ask them to send evidence of my repeat prescription to the pharmacy. The GP uses a system called EMIS, the Pharmacy I attended used a rival software, TPP. Therefore both could not communicate with each other to verify my need for this inhaler whilst I became more breathless and wheezy as time went on.
The solution to the issue? (although it is perfectly legal for the Pharmacist to make a judgment call on a solitary inhaler to a wheezing patient, they are registered health professionals for a reason you know):
I needed to register with the local medical practice
Meaning I needed to consent to the medical practice obtaining all my previous medical records
To then book an appointment to see the doctor
To then wait another 2 hours to get to see the doctor- taking up her lunch time
To obtain a prescription I already have on repeat
To go back to the pharmacist that turned me away to get an inhaler
The entire process took over 3 hours all the while physically no better off, which proves the point even though anecdotally. The current system is archaic and not in harmony with the times we live. Almost everything is digital – even the local old man I bought wood to build a fence from accepts online purchases and Google Pay.
The utilisation of electronic prescribing will streamline the present health system and save the NHS financially, by limiting cases of litigation as a result of ADRs and wasted appointments at GP practices (inhaler). Patients will benefit by being able to avoid unnecessary trips to their GP and in having quick access to their medication upon a visit to any cooperative pharmacy.
According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), in 2014, a total of 6,122 suicides were recorded in the UK for people aged 10 and older (10.8 deaths per 100,000 population), with suicide being the leading cause of death among young people aged 20-34 years of age. This equates to approximately one death every two hours, with around 75% of these being male.
Suicide is not a mental illness in itself, but rather a desperate attempt to control the overwhelming symptoms of the underlying mental health disease; making it the ultimate consequence for many mental illnesses. The Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey found that young people aged 16–24 were more likely to report suicidal thoughts than any other age group, with females in this age group having the highest levels of suicidal thoughts than any other demographic.
It is easy to rattle off a long list of statistics to prove a point, but there is a greater issue involved here, 72% of people who died from suicide between 2002 and 2012 had not contacted their GP or a healthcare professional about these feelings in the year leading up to the event.
There are a multitude of reasons to why patients are not reaching out for help. Severe depression and anxiety can make simple tasks such as going outside or calling your doctor too difficult. Simple everyday processes become a barrier to accessing help. It may be difficult to get access to a GP or a Doctor they trust, they may lack faith in the system to help them or are poorly informed about the help available, and the general stigma associated with mental health.
Although society and the media is trying very hard to change perceptions of mental health and the stigma associated with it, it remains a part of the problem. Stigma comes from multiple fronts. There is the social stigma inherent in a society, which can be localised due to the demographic disparity. Then there is a self-imposed stigma from the perception of the sufferer, at the possibility of being labelled as perhaps self-absorbed, their symptoms self-inflicted or unimportant. Either way, the fact that stigma exists around mental health compounds the suffering. Sufferers may feel it is a personal weakness or failure on their part, but the reality is that it is a disease that needs treatment and is ultimately not their fault.
If stigma, isolation and lack of availability of help compound the issue, the converse must also be true. People who receive support from caring friends and family, and who have access to mental health services are less likely to act on their impulses, however those impulses manifest.
According to the Care Quality Commission, evidence suggests that the number of children visiting A&E for mental health treatment has more than doubled since 2010. Many services are even failing to meet NHS guidelines for an out-of-hours crisis service.
Dr Nick Waggett, Chief Executive of the Association of Child Psychotherapists commented on the current state of the sector – “We do hear stories of children and young people having to have attempted suicide on a number of occasions actually before they are seen within the service… The problem is that then they’re very ill and it actually becomes increasingly difficult to offer them an effective treatment.”
I started this article to break the ice, stating the worst case scenario, but these points are just facts. Just as it is a fact that mental health is a continuum, the extremes are quite distinct, but the variations in between are gradual. If the number of fatalities represent one extreme, even though so prevalent, there will be so many more who are affected along the scale.
Everyone has mental health and just as everyone has different states of physical fitness, everyone has varying states of mental health. The two should not be thought of as separate since mental health plays a major role in your ability to maintain good physical health. Mental illnesses, such as depression and anxiety for example, affect your ability to participate in healthy behaviors.
Clearly there is a need for mental well-being to have the same prominence as physical well-being. Not to compare mental health disease with physical disease, but to appreciate that they coincide. Clinical depression is an illness that should be treated by a health care professional or a mental health professional, in as much as diabetes, arthritis or hypertension needs treatment.
Since the openness and access to sources of care and support can mitigate the risks associated with mental health issues, especially the prevalence at which these issues affect the young, we should publicise any available resources.
Tom Madders, Director of Communications, Campaigns and Participation at Young Minds, an organisation dedicated to tackling the issues around mental health in youth states- “Most young people spend much of their time online, and it can feel easier for them to communicate through messaging and online services than face-to-face”, this is where services such as Kooth come in. Kooth is a platform which offers online counselling and emotional well-being support for children and young people through a community of peers and a team of experienced counsellors.
It would seem that the use of health apps is an indispensable convenience and even preference which should be more widely adopted by local health organisations, including the greater health and social care system as a whole.
Many services are failing to meet the demands of those in need and the last thing which should happen if they have been able to reach out; is for young people to be rejected from a service they believed could help them. Whether there be a top-down, or bottom-up dissemination of these resources, it doesn’t matter, so long as access is made available. Anyone can download an app.
A helpful summary of available apps to support mental health well-being can be found here:
