Healthcare Innovation Expo Exhibitor Wins Three Awards

The European Scanning Centre (ESC) in Harley Street helped Bexley Care Trust’s community based Rapid Access Chest Pain Clinic scoop three awards at the recent Health Service Journal (HSJ) Awards.

It was the partnership between this prestigious independent healthcare clinic and Bexley Care Trust, which put in place a scheme allowing patients from Bexley to travel to the ESC to benefit from a revolutionary CT coronary angiogram with the Aquilion ONE CT scanner.

The 640-slice scanner, the only one available in independent healthcare in the UK, provides the most accurate coronary angiogram, needing only one heartbeat to deliver a complete 3D image of a patient’s heart with the highest degree of accuracy currently available anywhere in the world. This non-invasive investigation costs less than half of that for the usual battery of tests cardiac patients undergo, and takes a fraction of the time. Patients not only benefit from a far shorter waiting time, but their diagnosis is swift and more accurate than ever before meaning that their treatment can start weeks earlier than they can expect with the ‘normal’ service.

The Bexley-ESC project won three HSJ awards: those for Acute and Primary Care Innovation, the Patient-Centred Care award and finally, the Secretary of State’s Award for Excellence in Healthcare Management.

Dr Paul Jenkins, Medical Director at the ESC is delighted with the achievements made in Bexley following their GPs’ decision to team up with his centre: “From the outset of our initial pilot programme, I had no doubt that we could improve cardiac care for Bexley’s patients. We invested in the Aquilion ONE scanner because of the advances it offers in terms of delivering better diagnosis for cardiac conditions, and also because we saw the opportunity to work with NHS organisations to deliver not only improved patient outcomes, but critically, significant cost-savings as well. We have been proven right on both counts and are already in discussions with several other PCTs to look at forming partnerships with them too.”
  
With the focus on delivering innovative healthcare services and making the most of cutting-edge technology now shifting firmly to GPs, the partnership between the ESC and Bexley clearly demonstrates the huge opportunities to deliver first class services at a local level, and cost-efficiently, particularly where private and public health organisations work closely together.

Paul Jenkins believes that further partnerships between the ESC and the NHS could help to save thousands of lives each year and deliver hundreds of thousands of pounds in cost-savings: “If this sort of programme could be rolled out nationally, we would see many thousands of people diagnosed at an earlier stage with their cardiac conditions, treated more effectively, and without the need for any further testing to make an initial diagnosis. With the Aquilion ONE we are faster, more accurate and cheaper. At a time when we all recognise the importance of delivering long-term cost-savings, the ESC can very clearly demonstrate what it has to offer, and where it is leading the way.”