CHT2021 – Day Three
Thursday 03 March 2021
Day three of the conference has been another exciting day! Delegates heard inspirational talks on the adoption and spread of child health technology and improving children’s oral health, interactive seminars on public and patient involvement, intellectual property, and digital inclusion, oral presentations on the latest research, and a technology demonstration from Sheffield Biomedical Robotics Lab. Catch up on the day’s events below.
Day three began with a fascinating lunchtime seminar focused on technology for child and adolescent mental health. This session included talks on designing digital services with and for vulnerable teens (Dr Victoria Betton, Mindwave), how technology is being used in schools to support mental health (Dr Katherine Easton, University of Sheffield), and the impact of online mental health support during the pandemic (Aaron Sefi, Kooth).
We were delighted that Richard Stubbs, CEO of the Yorkshire and Humber Academic Health Science Network (Y&H AHSN), was able to join us in the studio to open the third day of the conference and deliver his keynote address. Richard gave an inspiring talk on the key factors that can help advance the adoption and spread of child health technology. The Y&H AHSN is helping to promote innovation development by facilitating cross-sector collaborations and initiatives, such as the Propel Accelerator Programme.
Later in the day, Dr Claire Stevens CBE (University Dental Hospital of Manchester) and Dr Ben Underwood (Brush DJ Ltd) co-delivered the second keynote of the day. Claire and Ben persuasively outlined why innovative approaches are needed to improve children’s oral health, and discussed integrating a new mobile application ‘Brush DJ’ into paediatric care pathways to increase adherence to teeth brushing.
Jennifer Preston (University of Liverpool) gave an excellent and thought-provoking interactive seminar on the impact and significance of collaborating with children and young people to develop health technology. Vanessa Stainthorpe (HGF) also delivered an informative and helpful seminar, in which intellectual property for child health technology was outlined and project teams were encouraged to discuss intellectual property early on.
Day three of the conference also included four oral abstract presentations, covering some of the latest research in child health technology. Talks were given on digital behaviour change interventions for oral health, powered mobility and healthcare policy change in Israel, digitalisation of vision-related patient reported outcome measures, and autonomous classification of sleep disorder patterns.
Sheffield Biomedical Robotics Lab demonstrated some exciting in vitro validation work of robotic bioreactors that are able to sense cell states and respond to precise mechanical stimuli. This was followed by an interesting Q&A session with Dr Dana Damian and Professor Paul Dimitri, in which the potential of the tissue repair and regeneration robots was discussed as a treatment of conditions such as short-bowel syndrome and long gap oesophageal atresia.
The final session of the day was delivered by Pete Nuckley (mHabitat). Pete gave an excellent overview of why NHS services need to become more digitally inclusive, and suggested developing technology with young people who are digitally excluded to ensure it is accessible for all young people.
We have thoroughly enjoyed the conference so far. We hope you are able to join us tomorrow for the final day of CHT2021 for what is sure to be another exciting and fascinating day!
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