New NHS England and NHS Improvement guidance has called for steps to implement a clinical service model for care home support during COVID-19.

The model includes a weekly ‘check in’ to review patients identified as a clinical priority for assessment and care; appropriate and consistent medical oversight from a GP; and more frequent contact with care homes where needs are identified. Remote monitoring is emphasised as key to the support model within the guidance. 

Spirit Digital’s CliniTouch Vie is a digital, remote monitoring platform designed to connect Care Homes, carers and nurses with their patients’ responsible GPs, addressing this exact need. By remotely and consistently monitoring care home residents, GPs can triage their care home patients and know when to intervene, reducing hospital admissions and increasing health system capacity.

Using CliniTouch Vie, carers will take patients’ vital signs readings and answer personalised health questions on a tablet computer, as frequently as needed. These readings are clinically validated and supported by sophisticated algorithms to give a risk assessment to the clinical teams – often GPs – responsible for the day to day care of these vulnerable individuals. GPs can then remotely connect with carers and patients to provide health and wellbeing advice, and intervene where and when more urgent care is needed.

Simon Applebaum, managing director, Spirit Digital, said: “The guidance from NHS England and NHS Improvement is very clear. This model is to be established as soon as possible and within the next two weeks at the latest to support care home residents as quickly as possible. CliniTouch Vie supports this model by extending the concept of the care home to one akin to a ‘virtual ward’. GPs get clinical information on their patients quicker and faster than they would do in that traditional setting which allows them to rapidly assess a patient, and maintain frequent and consistent medical oversight. Moreover, having immediate access to a dashboard of live clinical data on a group of patients enables rapid identification and triage of those individuals most at risk.”

CliniTouch Vie is a CE marked digital solution. Care Homes can use a supplied tablet and all required vital signs monitoring equipment if they don’t already have them available, which is provided with integrated 3G for intensive monitoring, education and empowerment with integrated direct messaging and video support. It is fast, simple and quick to implement for the most at-risk patients. The data within CliniTouch Vie is stored securely to ensure patient safety and confidentiality.

Chris Barker, CEO, Spirit Health Group, said: “The situation we find ourselves in with COVID-19 emphasises why Spirit exists – to make health easy. Right now, that’s more important than ever before. We are proud to be in a position to respond immediately to the call from NHS England and NHS Improvement to provide a remote support model for care homes, their residents and GPs.”