News

Innovation in health and care is preparing to take a dynamic new pace and scale across Leeds and the City Region, according to ‘Think big, start small, scale fast’, a new report from Leeds Academic Health Partnership.

The pandemic has hit people from the city’s most deprived areas the hardest, along with those from black and minority ethnicities, those in low paid or low skilled jobs, the elderly and those with underlying health conditions. The need for innovation and realising its benefits for local people by reducing health inequalities and driving economic growth, has intensified.

As a Leeds Academic Health Partnership member, the Yorkshire & Humber AHSN plays a core role in its progress and, as the report sets out, it’s now time to scale fast.

Launched five years ago, Leeds Academic Health Partnership started small. With just a tiny team at its core, governed by the city’s most senior leaders, our task was to bring experts together across the city to solve some of its hardest health and care challenges. To think big.

Today, with huge strides forward, Leeds is starting to benefit from our innovative programmes and transformational changes across the city.

There are three other programmes being delivered by the Leeds Academic Health Partnership, which will improve health and economic growth in the region and beyond:

• The Leeds Centre for Personalised Medicine and Health is developing world-leading ways to help prevent, identify and treat cancer and personalise care to support those who are frail, two of the city’s most pressing health needs. The pandemic has focussed attention on early diagnoses, testing during routine care and using technological solutions for monitoring, self-management, prioritisation and treatment in non-clinic settings.
• The emerging Living in Leeds programme is focusing on the acceptable use of health and care data for research and service planning.
• And, a new cross-sector regional healthtech partnership will be launching a network for healthtech businesses and supporting the adoption of products and services, which will improve health and care, grow jobs and drive economic growth in the region.

Managing Director Dr Liz Mear said: “We’re at an exciting stage in taking our work to the next level to improve health and care across the region and accelerate economic growth.  We will support our public sector and industry partners to develop and adopt innovation and to celebrate success at every stage, from starting small to scaling fast.”

Tom Riordan, Chair of Leeds Academic Health Partnership and Chief Executive of Leeds City Council said: “As the difficult job continues of planning citywide and regional recovery from the pandemic, the need for innovation and realising its benefits for local people, has intensified. With thanks to everyone across our partnership for what we’ve achieved so far, it’s time to push forward together and scale fast.”

Read the Leeds Academic Health Partnership report here: bit.ly/2YVr20m