Would seizing the moment and utilising the powerful technology at our disposal to create better outcomes for IBD patients?
I’ve had CD for 29 years, and I can honestly say, apart from a few exceptions which I will come on to, the way we use technology hasn’t really change in all those years.
The COVID lockdown has been particularly hard for us IBD patients; increased anxiety due to consultant appointments being cancelled, medical procedures like colonoscopies being postponed, the time we have with our consultants being limited due to the huge back log of cases, and let’s face it, the face-to-face time we had with our consultant pre COVID wasn’t exactly ideal was it? In fact, the national average for time spent with an NHS consultant is 10 minutes. 10 minutes! no wonder I was always severely anxious pre meeting with my consultant.
On reflection, I was, and am completely over the top when it comes to appointments with my consultant. As an example, I’d have my agenda typed out three weeks in advance of the consultation, constantly adding to it, re-writing it, running through different imagined conversations.
COVID has had that effect on me. I guess it’s having too much time on my hands to reflect on my CD and the care I receive. It’s hard enough dealing with the symptoms of this disease on a daily basis but when you throw the care, or lack of, you receive into the mix you can see why anxiety plays a huge part in A: the disease and B: the care we receive from our HCP.
So how could the future look?
I believe that new tech should be a core part of IBD management, I’m sure if we asked the IBD community they would reflect this opinion. Imagine new systems of IBD care that are built on new technology that would be more patient oriented and less bureaucratic A perfect example of that is the tech I have used for the last two years, IBDoc which is an App based home faecal calprotectin test kit.
This technology has completely changed the way I monitor my CD, and that ripple effect has implications on the way I interact with my IBD team: less calls, less invasive diagnostics, less time spent waiting and agonising for appointments. I wonder if a study was carried out on this piece of tech alone what the value in cost and resource it may save the NHS.
Tech tools that enable real-time 2-way communication between patients and health care providers will allow for a faster responsive service and should help to limit unscheduled, emergency appointments or needless visits to A&E dept. Delivery of app-based solutions is surely the next step in the medical tech revolution. This new tech will help to build confidence in patients and free up capacity for our time poor HCP.
I don’t believe the AI is quite there yet, so using chatbots for conversations around medical issues makes me feel uncomfortable. However, Chatbots are being developed for IBD HCP to collect disease activity, update medications, and obtain information on FC levels. We have real time data as citizens using Zoom, Teams, or Skype for our work meetings and this can easily be applied to health care.
Let’s wait and see what the tech future holds for us, I strongly believe we have a bright future on an otherwise overcast IBD day.
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