Technomed Ltd is a Care Quality Commission registered medical technology company that provides cardiology diagnostic services to NHS trusts and healthcare organisations.

Their UK based clinical staff, which include consultant cardiologists, help provide an ECG On-Demand service using an artificial intelligence system to assist in ECG analysis. This assists NHS clinical staff with patient ECG analysis to improve reporting times and increase accuracy.

Technomed previously used N3 to provide the ECG On-Demand service. They found data transfer speeds created bottlenecks and it was difficult to order the extra bandwidth needed to resolve these issues. When they migrated to their new HSCN connections, they reported 

• much higher speeds
• better availability due to increased network redundancy
• scope for future expansion and lower costs

Within the ECG On-Demand service, Technomed primarily offers two solutions:

1. 12-Lead ECG Interpretation, which record ECG results from patients to be sent to Technomed cardiologists for artificial intelligence (AI) assisted analysis and return a ECG report including patient management advice.
2. Ambulatory ECG Holter monitoring analysis, which is a wearable Holter monitor that records patient’s cardiac activity for patients for 1 to 21 days. This data is then uploaded for Technomed to analyse and a report returned within 2 hours to support the patients care.

Bradford District Care Foundation Trust (BDCT), a mental health provider, have completed their migration to HSCN and use Technomed’s ECG On-Demand platform in hospital, community and home settings. They perform ECGs for antipsychotic drug monitoring and physical health checks.

The trust previously used paper-based ECG machines and the ward doctor would interpret the generated ECG trace and manually input its data into the system. Depending upon the clinical need, the trace would then be posted to an acute care provider for analysis before results were returned to the BDCT. This process could take up to two weeks and could delay patient care.

With Technomed’s HSCN-connected 12-Lead ECG machines, the trust has experienced a faster process. Average turnaround times of 15 minutes from the clinician’s initial upload of a 12-lead ECG and 2 hours for a Holter report to be returned securely have been achieved. The purely digital process eliminates the need to use paper and frees up the hospital’s clinicians, allowing more time to attend to patients. 

Much shorter waiting times have significantly improved patient care as more serious cardiac conditions can be diagnosed earlier. The ECG is examined and reported by an experienced clinician in near real-time for serious ailments, so patients no longer need to be transferred between settings for confirmatory diagnoses. This is particularly significant for BDCT, as mental health patients are often reluctant to attend conventional healthcare settings resulting in shorter life expectancies than the general population. BDCT now have the ability to perform medical checks on their patients in familiar environments helping to address this inequality in life expectancy.

HSCN and Technomed have also enabled BDCT to think more broadly and widely about obtaining other clinical diagnostic technologies to ensure that they cater for every patient need.

Increased bandwidth

Migration to HSCN has increased Technomed’s bandwidth and connection speed significantly (50Mbps to 200Mbps). This allows for faster file exchanges - important for end-users as the ECG On-Demand service requires a large amount of file exchange to function. Files from ECG patches can be up to 100MB per 7 days use.

Since the move to HSCN, Technomed have reported a decrease in Holter monitor upload times from 4 minutes to less than 60 seconds. Technomed also continually monitors network usage and can contact their network provider, to increase the bandwidth when needed.

Real time responses

The increased speed of file exchange in the 12-Lead ECG interpretation process allows Technomed’s clinical team to report on patients’ ECG traces in near real-time. High risk or suspected serious cases can be identified more promptly. This makes patient care safer as it ensures they are treated efficiently by the appropriate clinicians in the appropriate care settings.

Greater accessibility

HSCN can be rapidly deployed in locations that were previously subject to slow N3 connectivity. This slow connectivity was unsuitable for Holter uploads. HSCN has given NHS clinical staff the ability to provide clinical diagnostic services to hard to reach patients, such as those in nursing homes, mental health units or prisons, via portable and fully mobile ECG recording solutions.

This benefits these patients as they may have a number of other health, social and/or mobility issues. Having the ability to use these mobile solutions reduces their need to travel to the hospital.