Health NZ international partnership strengthens approach to digital and AI innovation

SECTOR UPDATE - Health NZ | Te Whatu Ora

Health New Zealand, through its HealthX programme, has entered into an agreement with UCLPartners, a United Kingdom academic health science partnership, in a move that will provide a boost to its digital and AI innovation. 

The agreement supports HealthX’s work to carefully assess, test and scale digital and AI innovation that helps reduce administrative burden, support clinical workflow, and improve patient experience. 

UCLPartners works across the National Health Service (NHS), the publicly funded health system that provides healthcare to people across England, alongside universities and major hospitals to support the safe, consistent, and scalable adoption of innovation. 

Health NZ Chief Executive Dr Dale Bramley says the partnership is about learning from best-practice in the United Kingdom to understand whether improvements can be applied locally.

The partnership supports a deliberate and evidence-led approach, Dr Bramley says.

“The agreement allows us to draw on international experience from the NHS, one of the largest public health systems in the world.” 

HealthX Director Sonny Taite says insights from UCLPartners are already helping to inform Health NZ’s decision-making. 

“For example, their horizon scanning has provided additional confidence for the rollout of AI scribe technology in emergency departments, by showing how similar approaches are being used in other health systems,” Mr Taite says.

“This partnership allows us to test our thinking against real world experience, so we can make informed decisions about where to focus and how to apply digital and AI in practice.

“It also gives us access to international expertise in areas we’re actively exploring, including the use of AI in mental health settings, AI enabled diagnostics, and better ways to bring patient information together across systems to support care.” 

UCLPartners Chief Executive Chris Laing says he is excited to be partnering with Health New Zealand. 

“We share many healthcare and health inequalities challenges across our populations,” Dr Laing says. “We can learn a great deal from collaborating on shared approaches for the responsible use of data, digital and AI in healthcare.  

“I’ve been hugely impressed by the ambition of the Health New Zealand and Health X New Zealand teams and I’m excited about us working together in the years ahead.” 

Source: Health NZ | Te Whatu Ora

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