Service improvement and innovation ‘at the top table’ in health

eHealthNews.nz: National Systems & Strategy

Service improvement and innovation ‘at the top table’ in health

Wednesday, 4 October 2023

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NEWS - eHealthNews.nz editor Rebecca McBeth

The national service improvement and innovation directorate within Te Whatu Ora is a first for New Zealand and will enable a learning health system, driven by data, research and consumer and whānau priorities, the director of evidence, research and clinical trials says.

Robyn Whittaker spoke at the Co:Lab 2023 conference last month where she said the health system has never had a national directorate focused on service improvement and innovation, but the new structure puts it “right up there at the top table.”

The national director of improvement and innovation is Dale Bramley and under him sit seven core functions. Health analytics, led by Delwyn Armstrong, brings together all the analysts from within the old district health boards and Penny Andrew leads the national improvement and innovation team.

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The evidence, research and clinical trials function will create a “team of teams” including all research offices, research support people, library and knowledge services from around the country.

“It was in the old legislation that health services should partake in research, but it is now in Pae Ora that one of our roles very clearly is to understand and support research related to health,” Whittaker said.

The other functions are equity, population health gain, operations, and consumer engagement and whānau voice.

“All of those areas are really important to drive a learning health system and they need to be seen to be working together,” explained Whittaker.

The directorate will be driven by horizon scanning and evidence synthesis and everything will be evaluated from an equity perspective.

“It is driven by research, by consumer and whānau priorities, and by the data as well.”

She said none of this will be done in isolation, but in partnership with localities, service providers, and iwi partnership boards.

Whittaker also outlined the innovation priorities of the national team.

She said an ‘innovation funnel’ will provide standardised pathways for innovative ideas coming from all areas, including research, staff, consumers, and companies.

This will involve a ‘proof of concept’ stage, ‘proof of value’ stage and then a ‘scale up stage’ and Te Whatu Ora is working with the Consortium for Medical Device Technologies (CMDT) on developing this.

Also, the creation of innovation hubs - collaborative workspaces around the country where people from across the sector can work together on these new ideas – and an innovation fund.

Whittaker said the top three current priorities for innovation are; virtual care, transformation accelerators, and equity catalyst programmes.