A software system for assessing vital signs of hospital patients; a drug-free gel for treating the symptoms of osteoarthritis, and point-of-care testing kits that measures CRP in blood, serum or plasma are the subjects of four newly-published Medtech Innovation Briefings from the National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NICE).
The documents are commissioned by NHS England and produced in support of the NHS Five Year Forward View as one of a number of steps to accelerate innovation in new treatments and diagnostics.
It is hoped this impartial information about innovative devices and diagnostics will help NHS and social care professionals and buyers and commissioners of services with their local decision-making.
The briefings include a review of relevant published evidence and the likely costs of using the technology, but they are not NICE guidance and do not make any recommendations on the value of using the technologies. Whether or not to use the products described is entirely the choice of local staff. However, they will help avoid the need for organisations to produce similar information, so saving staff time, effort and resources.
The latest Medtech Innovation Briefings to be published are:
- QuikRead go for C-reactive protein testing in primary care (Orion Diagnostica): The QuikRead go system consists of the QuikRead go instrument and a range of QuikRead go CRP test kits. It is an in vitro diagnostic test intended to determine the amount of CRP in the blood of people who present with symptoms of infection. A QuikRead go CRP+Hb test is also available and provides additional haemoglobin concentration measurements from the same sample. The test would be done at the point of care in primary care for people with suspected bacterial lower respiratory tract infection
- VitalPAC for assessing vital signs of patients in hospital (System C Healthcare): VitalPAC is a mobile software information system for monitoring the vital signs of adults, including pregnant women, and children in hospital. Using manually-entered or automatically-captured vital sign data, it is designed to quickly identify deterioration in their condition and alert clinical staff. VitalPAC can also be used to guide decisions about when people are well enough for discharge
- FLEXISEQ for osteoarthritis (Pro Bono Bio): FLEXISEQ is an aqueous gel containing hydrophilic, nanoscale lipid vesicles with a phospholipid bilayer. The manufacturer claims that, because of their composition, Sequessome vesicles can pass through the skin to reach a joint. Applied twice daily to the soft tissues around the affected joint, as the gel dries the water evaporates and this is reported to trigger the movement of the hydrophilic Sequessome vesicles through the skin, relieving the symptoms of arthritis. FLEXISEQ is classed as a medical device because it has a physical mode of action and contains no active drug
- Alere Afinion CRP for C-reactive protein testing in primary care (Alere): The Alere Afinion CRP test consists of the Afinion AS100 analyser and the Alere Afinion CRP assay. It is an in vitro diagnostic test intended to determine the amount of CRP in human whole blood, serum or plasma. The analyser measures the colour intensity of the membrane, and this is proportional to the amount of CRP in the sample
Click on the headings to read the briefings in full.
