What does innovation mean for research?

A panel of experts in genomics, emergency care, participant recruitment and innovation strategy and policy shared their thoughts on what innovation means for research at the tenth annual Health and Care Research Wales conference in Cardiff.

Dr Rachel Dodds, Principal Clinical Scientist at the All Wales Medical Genomics Service was joined at the conference parallel session by Professor Nigel Rees, Assistant Director of Research and Innovation at the Welsh Ambulance Service University NHS Trust; Dr Tim Sprosen, Executive Director for Participant Recruitment Operations at Our Future Health, and Tom James, Head of Innovation Strategy and Policy at Welsh Government to explore how new ideas, technologies, and ways of working are addressing current and future challenges in research.

Opening the session, Dr Dodds gave a presentation on QuicDNA, a study looking at the implementation of a liquid biopsy into the lung cancer diagnostic pathway. 

There are around 10 different genes or biomarkers that need to be tested for the most common type of lung cancer, which has traditionally been done on tumorous samples from patients acquired by an invasive surgical procedure. 

Dr Dodds said: “What we are doing with QuicDNA is looking at liquid biopsies. There is a blood sample, and within it there will be fragments of DNA that have been shed by the tumour and are circulating around. Using this test we can profile the genomics of that tumour and use targeted therapies the patient will benefit from.”

Professor Rees showcased a project looking into the capability of drones in delivering automated external defibrillators to patients suffering an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest, exploring challenges of geography, increased ambulance incident demand, increasingly elderly populations and health risk factors.

He added: “The UK Research and Innovation definition of responsible innovation takes into case the wider impacts of research and aims to ensure the unintended consequences of research and avoiding the barriers to dissemination and adoption are reduced. This has gone into our planning and we definitely see research and innovation partners in producing high quality healthcare contributing to each other.”

Dr Sprosen examined life expectancy in an increasingly ageing population with more chronic conditions diagnosed at age 65, and the need for research to focus on prevention rather than treatments.

He added: “The great majority of NHS resources go into treatment and not prevention.  We need more evidence from randomised controlled trials and other evidence. There are also many other diseases, for example such as mental health conditions, that don’t get much research.”

Mr James spoke about the innovation strategy for healthcare, the policy that Welsh Government is looking at developing across the NHS and how they are delivering within the innovation and partnerships programme, removing historical duplication and building up the infrastructure to support people working in healthcare to innovate. 

For the full programme, please visit the conference page