Portsmouth NHS Trusthas significantly improved patient experiences by automating appointments, referrals and record management processes. In a first-of-its-kind deployment, Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust’s Maternity Services & Midwifery unit has worked with intelligent automation companies, Digital Workforce and PSTG, to boost patient experiences. Since the project began, patient waiting times to receive an appointment have reduced from 6-8 weeks to just 24 hours, while appointment capacity has increased by a third. Furthermore, the deployment has saved 18,000 hours of staff time, the equivalent of £225,000 in internal staffing costs or 12 full-time employees. Significantly, the Trust has cut a considerable backlog which, at its height, saw 5,000 patients waiting for appointments. The Trust incorporated Digital Workforce’s Intelligent Automation technology by feeding it with the processes of an end-to-end patient journey, along with the required safety standards. After testing, the solution was deployed to run constantly, capturing and sharing data across ...
Cancer Research UK has announced its international partnership with France’s Institut National Du Cancer (INCa), investing £8.6m to drive world-class global cancer research. As part of the global Cancer Grand Challenges initiative, the partnership will help fund world-class researchers to take on cancer’s toughest challenges. Claiming almost ten million lives every year, cancer is the second leading cause of death worldwide. The INCa is currently the first to pledge funds to support several teams in a single round of the Cancer Grand Challenges initiative, as well as the initiative’s original founding partners, Cancer Research UK and the US National Cancer Institute (NCI). Since its founding in 2020, more than £210m has been invested in the initiative, which aims to build a scientifically elite, interdisciplinary community to fill knowledge gaps in cancer and drive progress. The initiative comprises diverse international organisations, collaborators and research leaders, including the Scientific Foundation of the ...
By Kate Goodwin Pictured: Businessmen shaking hands/iStock, Tippapatt Japanese biopharma PeptiDream on Wednesday announced yet another licensing agreement with Roche’s Genentech, this time worth up to $1 billion. The latest deal builds on previous partnerships between the two companies starting in December 2015 with licensing in 2016 and an expansion deal in 2018. PeptiDream will receive $40 million upfront for R&D of its macrocyclic peptide-radioisotope drug conjugates. Going forward, another $1 billion is on the line in milestones plus tiered royalties of product sales to markets outside of Japan. PeptiDream will oversee preclinical activities to develop a peptide-RI drug conjugate and retain rights in Japan for any products developed. While a particular target was not disclosed, PeptiDream CEO Patrick Reid said in a statement that the company hopes to “bring innovative first-in-class peptide radiopharmaceuticals to patients worldwide.” The peptide-RI drug conjugates in the deal with Genentech are designed to use ...
Thirty states have been conducting Medicaid and CHIP automatic renewals incorrectly, leading to many individuals being wrongly removed from coverage. Because of this, nearly 500,000 children and other individuals will have their coverage reinstated. By MARISSA PLESCIA After determining an issue in the way many states were handling Medicaid and CHIP redeterminations, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced Thursday that coverage will be reinstated for nearly 500,000 children and other individuals.“Thanks to swift action by HHS, nearly half a million individuals, including children, will have their coverage reinstated, and many more will be protected going forward. HHS is committed to making sure people have access to affordable, quality health insurance – whether that’s through Medicare, Medicaid, the Marketplace, or their employer,” said HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra in a statement. “We will continue to work with states for as long as needed to help prevent anyone eligible ...
Meitheal Pharmaceuticals has signed an exclusive licensing agreement with the China-based Tonghua Dongbao Pharmaceutical to commercialise three insulin biosimilars in the US. The insulin biosimilars include two rapid-acting insulins, namely insulin lispro and insulin aspart, and the long-acting insulin glargine. The rights were acquired by Meitheal’s parent company Nanjing King-Friend Biochemical Pharmaceutical. Eli Lilly reported global sales of $440.4m for the branded version of insulin lispro Humalog in n Q2 2023, while Sanofi’s Lantus (insulin glargine) had global sales of $353m in the same period, as per the company’s Q2 financials. Meitheal will have exclusive US marketing rights after the insulin biosimilars are approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which is expected in 2026. As part of the agreement, both Tonghua Dongbao and Nanjing King-Friend Biochemical would be responsible for the development and supply of all three insulin biosimilars. All three companies will also share the royalties ...
The Danish artificial intelligence (AI) biotech Evaxion has announced plans to develop an mRNA vaccine against gonorrhea in partnership with Afrigen Biologics. Gonorrhea antigens identified through Evaxion’s EDEN platform have shown strong protective effects in preclinical trials, as per the company. The partnership will investigate the function of these antigens when presented in the mRNA form. After the validation phase, the partners will discuss an agreement for clinical development and commercialisation, with the opportunity to involve additional collaborators. Cape Town, South Africa-based Afrigen Biologics is set up as a specialised centre to support mRNA vaccine development and technology transfer, will take charge of developing the mRNA vaccine in low and middle-income countries and African territories. Gonorrhea is a sexually transmitted infection, caused by the bacteria Neisseria gonorrhoeae. It heightens the vulnerability to HIV, a prevalent health concern in many low and middle-income countries (LMICs). Birgitte Rønø, Evaxion’s Chief Scientific Officer ...
The universal vaccine could protect people against more strains of flu The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has announced that it has begun dosing patients in a phase 1 clinical trial of a new influenza (flu) vaccine candidate, FluMos-v2, to evaluate the vaccine for safety and its ability to elicit an immune response. Designed by researchers at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases’s (NIAID) Vaccine Research Center (VRC), FluMos-v2 works to induce antibodies against various influenza strains by displaying part of the influenza virus haemagglutinin (HA) protein in repeating patterns on self-assembling nanoparticle scaffolds, preparing the immune system to recognise and fight the actual virus. Sponsored by NIAID, the trial is expected to enrol 24 healthy individuals, aged 18 to 50 years, to receive two intramuscular injections of the vaccine candidate, 16 weeks apart. The researchers aim to enrol 12 participants in a lower dose group (60mcg per ...
Around 340,000 to 444,000 people in the UK carry one of nine pathogenic gene variants The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has recommended that more people get tested for genes linked to ovarian cancer. The new guideline aims to raise awareness and increase the availability of genetic testing, allowing people to take preventive measures, including surgery, to prevent the development of ovarian cancer. Anyone can carry a gene linked to ovarian cancer, including women, men, transgender people, and non-binary people, which can be passed on to their children. In the UK, around 340,000 to 440,000 people carry one of the nine pathogenic variants – BRCA1, BRCA2, MLH1, MSH2, MSH6, RAD51C, RAD51D, BRIP1 and PALB2 – that cause cancer, 3% of whom know they have a high-risk gene. NICE has recommended that genetic services should test and assess the likelihood of people carrying the genes, including those who ...
The World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Bank have published the 2023 Universal Health Coverage (UHC) Global Monitoring Report, which revealed some alarming statistics concerning out-of-pocket (OOP) health expenditure and the global health service coverage rate. The report showed that only 42 out of 138 countries have achieved progress in expanding UHC service coverage since 2000 while also reducing OOP spending for the population. Alternatively, 108 countries reported worsening to no significant changes in health coverage since 2015, the year when Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were adopted. All 108 countries that experienced slow progress in UHC service coverage are low-income countries (LICs) and lower-middle-income countries (LMICs). Despite that, the overall global UHC Service Coverage Index (SCI) score increased from 45 to 68 out of 100 between 2000 and 2021, but no change was reported in the global SCI score between 2019 and 2021. Notably, a significant variation in country-level ...
EpiSwitch is designed for men with prostate cancer risk in the UK and is 94% accurate Oxford BioDynamics – a company developing precision medicine tests – has announced that its EpiSwitch Prostate Screening (PSE) blood test will be available to UK patients. The existing PSA test is 55% accurate, and is considered an unreliable test by many doctors, including those in the NHS. The new PSE test has been designed to run alongside the standard PSA test, and combines the PSA score with five proprietary epigenetic biomarkers to predict – with 94% accuracy – the presence (or absence) of prostate cancer. The PSE test has emerged after nearly a decade’s long collaboration between OBD, Imperial College London, University of East Anglia, Imperial College NHS Trust and leading prostate cancer experts across the UK. The development was also part of the wider PROSTAGRAM screening pilot. Mathias Winkler, Consultant Urologist and Surgeon ...
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