A tech firm has teamed up with Swansea University on a digital healthcare project which, if successful, could change Wales' health and social care sector.
CPR Global Tech, based in Lakeside Technology Park, has partnered with the university for an Innovate UK Management Knowledge Transfer Partnership to research how wearable devices could allow NHS and social care staff to monitor patients remotely.
The two-year project will receive £143,000 in funding from Innovate UK, allowing the firm to research the potential impact of wearable health devices on Wales' health and social care sector.
The Swansea tech firm will work with All-Wales Intensive Learning Academy for Innovation in Health & Social Care (ILA IHSC) at Swansea University on the project.
Founded in 2010. CPR Global Tech has a track record of developing products that impact everyday life including its call-blocking technology used by over one million customers worldwide.
More recently, the team have developed and deployed the CPR Guardian, an SOS personal alarm with a fall detector alert for vulnerable adults, lone workers and those living with Dementia and Alzheimer's.
It offers accurate fall detection, a personal alarm, location tracking, heart rate monitoring and a 24/7 monitoring service and will form the basis of the project with Swansea University.
Experts will evaluate how the technology could be deployed by the NHS and social care departments to monitor vulnerable patients in their homes, improving care and patient outcomes.
Chief operating officer Chelsea Davies said: "At CPR Global Tech, we are proud to develop products based on our ethos of caring, protecting and reassuring. So we are incredibly excited about our new partnership with Swansea University, which is about harnessing the power of wearable health technology to improve patient outcomes - not only in health and social care settings but also in patients' homes.
"For example, falls amongst older people are a significant public health concern in Wales, with a third of people over 65 and a half of those aged over 85 falling every year. Falls have a substantial financial impact on health and social care services, costing the NHS approximately £2.3 billion every year. Our technology alerts emergency contacts via text message with a precise location update whenever a fall happens, ensuring more severe injuries associated with longer waits are avoided.
"Working with the Innovation ILA team at Swansea University, local health providers and patients, we will set up trials and collect detailed stakeholder feedback. Through this work, we aim to gather a robust dataset that will help inform how wearable tech can help improve care and patient outcomes.
"This project is strategically important to us as a business and Welsh society as a whole. Our project has the potential to make significant improvements to the way the NHS deals with falls, achieving better outcomes for patients and vital cost savings for our health service."
CPR Global Tech employs 20 people across sales, technical support and product development roles. It received the Queen's Award for Enterprise in 2018 and 2020.
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