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About: OBH Team

OBH awarded a prestigious Queen’s Award for Enterprise!

We are thrilled to reveal that Outcomes Based Healthcare has been awarded a highly prestigious Queen’s Award for Enterprise, for “outstanding achievements in Innovation”!

Innovation is integral to OBH’s mission to drive health system improvement through measurement and incentivisation of health outcomes. In fact, we haven’t stopped innovating since OBH started 8 years ago… from creating our Segmentation Engine that drives the OBH Outcomes Platform, to developing HEALTHSPAN® as a way of measuring a population’s healthy lifespan, to supporting the NHS in the pandemic, and our ongoing commitment to supporting the work of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Longevity, #teamOBH really has been busy.

We are so grateful to everyone who has supported us over the years and feel honoured to be part of #TheQueensAwards for Enterprise 2021. Read about why OBH has been awarded a Queen’s Award here – find us on page 30!

Finally, congratulations to all our fellow #QueensAwards winners!

Happy 8th Birthday OBH!

It feels like a long time ago that we set out with OBH- in fact, 8 years ago exactly! The original mission was to help solve one of the biggest problems in healthcare- enabling effective measurement and payment systems for prevention, and what really matters to people. In short, their health outcomes. We’ve grown over the years and the way we go about that mission has evolved, but we’re still innovating around that core purpose.

It’s been a busy year supporting the NHS in the pandemic, and we have been delighted to support some fabulous organisations in their work. Last week saw the release of the Levelling up Health Report by the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Longevity alongside their work on the Business for Health Index. We remain committed to supporting this work in whatever way we can.

OBH are also delighted to have worked with King’s College London on the recent flagship report addressing drivers of Multiple Long Term Conditions, published by Guy’s and St Thomas’ Foundation.

Thank you to OBH’s friends, supporters and team for supporting us over the last 8 years!

OBH is a strategic partner with NHS England on the #COVID19 Data and Analytics Community!

We’re so excited to announce that OBH are now a strategic partner with NHS England on the #COVID19 Data & Analytics Community! Lots of exciting collaborative #segmentation #analytics work to come – understanding & deriving meaningful insight into population health at a local, regional and national level!

More information on the #futureNHS Data and Analytics for Covid-19 workspace can be found here.

Launch of the Population and Person Insight (PaPI) report to improve understanding of patient healthcare needs!

OBH are thrilled to announce the launch of the Population and Person Insight dashboard! #TeamOBH have been working in partnership with NHS England and NHS Improvement, and NHS Arden & GEM CSU on a data-driven approach to understanding and deriving meaningful insight into population health. The dashboard has been developed using national datasets – including secondary care, emergency care, community services and specialised services data – to group patients into segments based on common healthcare needs.

Understanding the population by cohorts of those with similar health and care needs is integral to a more person-focussed health system. Using the Bridges to Health segmentation dataset, this tool enables deeper insight into people who are healthy, people with long term conditions, people with disability, as well as those people who are nearer the end of life with cancer, organ failure, frailty and dementia.

The interactive tool contains a series of views so that users can easily explore and interrogate these population segments at a national, regional, system, CCG and PCN level.

With four years’ worth of data, users can also drill down into acute utilisation, cost and outcomes by segment to support service planning and redesign. Visualisations by age, ethnicity, deprivation and socio-demographic classification help to easily identify cohorts for further investigation and analysis.

In response to the current pandemic, a COVID-19 view was also developed with the aim of aiding NHS restoration and recovery programmes by helping systems to identify their vulnerable populations who have one or more ‘at risk’ conditions to inform decision-making around shielding and planning for the largest vaccination programme in the history of the NHS.

Sukhmeet Panesar, Deputy Director of Strategy and Development at NHS England and NHS Improvement said: “The NHS generates a huge amount of data which can be used to drive improvements in care and how services are run. By providing health and care systems with data which is grouped by population segments we can support NHS and local authority leaders to plan effective services and interventions based on meeting the healthcare needs, risks and priorities of their patients and citizens.”

Ayub Bhayat, Chief Data Officer at Arden & GEM said: “The population and person insight report acts as a diagnostic tool for every level of the system, enabling commissioners and providers to spot opportunities for further analysis and intervention. By providing a starting point for population health management approaches, we can then work with local areas to refine the model with their local intelligence and benchmark emerging opportunities.”

Dr Nasrin Hafezparast, Chief Clinical Data Officer at Outcomes Based Healthcare said: “The internationally-recognised Bridges to Health segmentation model provides a person-centred approach. By using this approach as the foundation for the new report we can categorise the entire population of 62 million people into eight segments, with 55 subsegment or condition registries on a monthly basis, over the past 4 years. It includes a first ever view of population-level healthy lifespan, or HEALTHSPAN®. The report also incorporates feedback from a wide range of groups including clinicians to ensure the data is meaningful.”

The report, which was launched on 15 February, is available to healthcare commissioners and providers within the NHS ViewPoint analytical application.

For more information about the report, and the wider population and person insight workstream, visit the dedicated FutureNHS workspace.

OBH awarded supplier status on G-Cloud 12!

We are very happy to announce that the Government’s Crown Commercial Service has again awarded Outcomes Based Healthcare supplier status on the latest Digital Marketplace platform, G-Cloud 12!

The OBH® Outcomes Platform is available as a Cloud Software Service & provides users with person-centred health outcome measures at a population and cohort/condition level, including OBH’s core prevention outcomes: HEALTHSPAN®. The Platform is powered by OBH’s® Segmentation Engine – an essential, core backbone for population health management data analytics work across different local NHS & local authority organisations, and their health and care partners. The Segmentation Engine is now also available as a ‘stand alone’ module, for more experienced NHS & local authority analytical teams, who wish to incorporate population segmentation datasets into their existing analytics work.

Based on the foundations of the Bridges to Health segmentation model, both solutions provide person-centred, meaningful insights for specific population segments & care pathways.

Find us on G-Cloud 12:
-OBH® Outcomes Platform (https://lnkd.in/daaNepF)
-OBH® Segmentation Engine (https://lnkd.in/dyU7wJf)

Diabetes #COVID19 mortality & risk in England paper published in The Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology!

Fantastic to see NHSE England and Public Health England’s #diabetes #COVID19 mortality & risk in England paper published in The Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology!

The whole population study used the Bridges to Health National Population Segmentation dataset developed in partnership between Outcomes Based Healthcare, NHS England, Arden and Gem CSU and Public Health England to identify co-morbidities and ethnicity.

One of the many brilliant examples of the power of #healthanalytics in creating actionable insights to support the national response to Covid-19 – driven by a multidisciplinary team of clinicians, analysts, researchers and more!

Read the full paper here.

 

National HEALTHSPAN and Lifespan modelling in the UK features in Longevity Trends 2020 Report!

Published by the Longevity Leaders in August 2020, the report summarises the most important trends in longevity research to date that businesses, policy makers, scientists and the general population should be aware of.

Having recently presented at the Longevity Leaders World Congress 2020 on National HealthSpan and Lifespan modelling in the UK, CEO Rupert’s presentation was summarised in this edition of the Longevity Trends Report. Making reference to OBH’s objective HEALTHSPAN® measure which monitors population-level changes in the proportion of life spent in good health, the whitepaper highlights the importance of applying an objective approach to measuring individual health status, covering whole populations.

With evidence suggesting that more people are being diagnosed with significant long-term conditions earlier in their lives, and living with them for longer than we had previously thought, measuring the progression of ill health and population level changes over a life course has never been more important.

Read the full report here.

OBH awarded grant by UK government to fund project – Outcomes Risk Scores for Covid-19 Vulnerable Populations!

OBH are delighted to announce that we have been awarded a grant by the UK government to fund our project – Outcomes Risk Scores for Covid-19 Vulnerable Populations!

Rapidly repurposing the robust foundations of the Bridges to Health national population segmentation model developed in conjunction with NHS England, Public Health England and Arden and Gem CSU, the development of Covid-19 Risk scores will allow an enhanced understanding of the relative and independent risk factors relating to #Covid-19. This analysis will enable the risk profile of local areas to be accurately assessed and stratified according to the latest emerging evidence, and also support our understanding of the effect of age and ethnicity on Covid-19 complications, independent of comorbidities.

The Innovate UK Covid-19 Rapid Response competition received a record 8,600 applications, investing £40 million to support UK businesses to focus on emerging or increasing needs of society and industries during and following the #Covid-19 pandemic. Find out more about our Covid-19 work here!

Rupert speaks at the Longevity Leaders World Congress on National HealthSpan and Lifespan modelling in the UK!

In keeping with the somewhat virtual world most of us continue to live in, CEO Rupert spoke at the Longevity Leaders World Congress 2020 via livestream this week on the topic of “Data-dive: National HealthSpan and Lifespan modelling in the UK”!

OBH recently contributed to the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Longevity ‘The Health of the Nation’ national strategy for #HealthierLongerLives, and Rupert discussed the importance of applying an objective approach to measuring individual health status, covering whole populations. This evidence suggests that more people are being diagnosed with significant long-term conditions earlier in their lives, and living with them for longer than we had previously thought. So measuring the progression of ill health and population level changes over a life course has never been more important.

Using routinely collected, linked longitudinal health and care data, from multiple ‘real world’ care settings, OBH’s objective HEALTHSPAN® measure monitors population-level changes in the proportion of life spent in good health.

More information here!

Juliana presents at the IBRAVS Knowledge Agenda on Value-Based Healthcare in England – Implementation at Population Level!

Speaking live from London to an audience over 5000 miles away (!), COO Juliana recently presented at the IBRAVS Knowledge Agenda 2020, on the topic: Value-Based Healthcare in England – Implementation at Population Level.

As part of a webinar series aimed at improving our understanding of what “value in health” really means, Juliana provided a whistle-stop tour of the current VBHC landscape in the UK, the importance of segmentation according to clinical needs at a whole population level, and the application of VBHC initiatives and segmentation within the context of Covid-19.

To find out more (and if your Portuguese is up to scratch!) click the link to the full video now available to watch on Youtube!

HAPPY SEVENTH BIRTHDAY OBH!

As we mark our birthday virtually this year against the backdrop of the current pandemic, we’d like to thank all of our amazing OBH supporters, advisors and friends who’ve been part of our exciting journey measuring what matters most in health over past 7 years! Here are a few highlights from what has definitely been the busiest (and more recently, the most unpredictable!) year yet…. including the prospect of potentially taking on some clinical work again amongst the data analytics work for some of us.

Over the past 12 months, OBH have been working with NHS England on the implementation of an actionable, common, data-driven approach to population segmentation. In collaboration with NHS Arden and GEM Commissioning Support Unit and the Data, Analysis and Intelligence Service (DAIS) at NHSE/I, the programme of work seeks to build a common framework for segmentation by developing the ‘Bridges to Health’ segmentation model using data sources from the National Commissioning Data Repository (NCDR).

Building on the solid foundations of this person-centred data model, over the past few weeks we’ve been very busy adjusting the model to address the immediate needs of the COVID-19 pandemic response. This aims to support work to establish the populations currently thought to be most ‘vulnerable’ to severe illness from COVID -19. Find out more here.

Back in February, which already seems like a completely different era, we were delighted to have contributed to the APPG ‘The Health of the Nation’ national strategy for #HealthierLongerLives! We look forward to continuing to support this important work, applying OBH’s objective HealthSpan™ and HealthyLifespan® Index at a population level to meet the government’s mission of five extra healthy years by 2035. Given recent events, ensuring a renewed focus on the prevention of ill-health, whilst narrowing the gap between the richest and the poorest seems more urgent than ever. Read the full report here.

Having been selected to participate in the Health Data Research UK Sandbox in September 2019, we look forward to continuing this work involving the use of linked, longitudinal health data to measure and validate OBH’s HealthSpan™ and HealthyLifespan® index measures throughout the future. Find out more here.

And last but not least, we had a great time hosting our second clinical associates network event at the Health Foundry back in October! It was fantastic to see so many members of the #obhnetwork community and welcome some new faces too.

Despite current events, we look forward to seeing what the next year has to hold in what we hope will be a slightly less strange time for everyone! From everyone in the OBH team, we’d like to thank you again for all your support over the past 7 years. We hope you, your families and colleagues keep safe and well.

#OBHis7 #outcomes #healthspan

Launch of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Longevity national strategy for #HealthierLongerLives!

OBH are delighted to have contributed to the APPG ‘The Health of the Nation’ national strategy for #HealthierLongerLives, launched in February 2020!

OBH’s objective HEALTHSPAN® and HEALTHY LIFESPAN® Index measures use routinely collected, population-level, linked longitudinal health & care data across multiple care settings. These accurately measure the proportion of people’s lives which are spent in good health – either at national, regional or local level. By applying such metrics at a population level, we are able to gain a comprehensive and objective understanding of the health of the nation. This includes the health and care expenditure associated with improvements or deteriorations in HEALTHSPAN.

We look forward to continuing to support this fantastic work to meet the government’s mission of five extra healthy years by 2035, ensuring a renewed focus on the prevention of ill-health, while narrowing the gap between richest and poorest.

Read the full report here: https://appg-longevity.org/events-publications.

Outcomes, HEALTHSPAN and more at the second OBH Clinical Associates Network event!

In October, OBH were delighted to host the second Clinical Associates Network event at the Health Foundry!

Senior Analysts Ellie and Rose kicked off with OBH’s latest work on population segmentation and HealthSpan measurement. They discussed the importance of baseline measures and real-time measurement when monitoring outcomes, as well as the adaptation of the Bridges to Health segmentation model to allow local health and care systems to configure their segments according to their priorities.

Bob Klaber then followed with a fantastic overview of his work on the Connecting Care for Children programme, highlighting the importance of building relationships across providers and people, summarising key design prinicples to consider when organising care models for children and young people.

It was fantastic to see so many members of the #obhnetwork community and welcome some new faces too….we look forward to hosting the next event!

Read more about the OBH Clinical Associates Network here.

OBH continue next phase of Multiple Long-Term Condition programme alongside Guy’s and St Thomas’ Charity & King’s College London

We are delighted to announce that OBH will continue working in partnership with Guy’s and St Thomas’ (GSTT) Charity and King’s College London (KCL) on a programme of work focussed around understanding and slowing the progression to multiple long-term conditions.

The first stage of the project involved defining a list of 32 long-term conditions and six risk factors through a rigorous consultation method with patient representatives, partners from the NHS, local government and the voluntary sector. Both national and international definitions of long-term conditions were analysed, amongst other criteria including the impact of long-term conditions on people’s lives, treatment burden, age of onset and likelihood of progression to further long-term conditions, amongst others.

The next stage will continue to explore multiple long-term conditions, including factors like the impact of deprivation in people’s journey and the role of key life events as potential windows for early intervention. We look forward to continue working in partnership with GSTT Charity and KCL on this exciting and important project!

Read more about the project here.

OBH selected for Health Data Research UK Sandbox!

We are very excited to announce that OBH has been selected to participate in the Health Data Research UK Sandbox!

The initial phase of the programme will involve the use of linked, longitudinal health data to measure and validate OBH’s HEALTHSPAN and HEALTHY LIFESPAN index measures.

Health Data Research UK is the national institute for health data science with a mission to align the UK’s health data to enable discoveries that improve people’s lives. The Health Data Research UK Sandbox is a virtual testing environment for products, services, innovations or knowledge that require access to large scale data to improve the health of patients and the population. The Sandbox will provide test cases for a government initiative, delivered by Health Data Research UK, to transform access to the UK’s health data – safely and securely – for research that could pioneer new and faster treatments for patients and find new cures for diseases.

We are delighted to have been selected and look forward to being involved in this exciting programme!

OBH and Centene UK launch new publication on the Evaluation of Outcomes Frameworks for use in Integrated Care Systems

The paper launched in April reviewed 5 outcomes frameworks, including the NHS Outcomes Framework (NHSOF) and The Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF), with the aim of understanding the technical measure integrity and viability behind each indicator. OBH drew from their clinical, analytics and NHS data experience to capture considerations such as data availability, accuracy and robustness over time.

Whilst publicly available frameworks can be used for a range of purposes including monitoring quality, benchmarking providers against one another and to highlight variation in care provision, the paper argues that these frameworks are less effective when measuring and monitoring outcomes at a local-level. OBH recommends a greater focus on outcomes, a well-defined and locally configured segmentation model, local agreement on outcomes across the health and care system, as well as the use of local linked datasets, across all providers to allow the measurement of true outcomes in near-real time.

The official launch of the paper took place at the NHS Elect event in April on “Reflections on Delivering Integrated Care in the NHS”, where CEO Rupert and Senior Health Outcomes Analyst Ellie presented the findings. The event featured presentations from Centene about their work in the UK, as well as case studies from across the NHS Elect network. The full paper can be found on the Resources page on our website.

Rupert speaks at PCC event on Measuring Outcomes in Integrated Services

In April, CEO Rupert spoke at the Primary Care Commissioning event on “Measuring outcomes in Integrated Services”.

The event covered various themes including population segmentation, outcomes measurement for the currently healthy population, contracts to secure integrated service provision, as well as the financial considerations of implementing integrated services. Delegates included CCG chief officers, directors of commissioning and directors of finance.

Read more here.

CEO Rupert invited to join the Strategic Advisory Board for the All Party Parliamentary Group for Longevity

We are delighted to announce that in April, CEO Rupert was invited to join the Strategic Advisory Board for the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Longevity, chaired by Lord Filkin.

The APPG aims to address the scientific, technological and socio-economic issues related to the growing ageing demographic to promote living younger, healthier and longer lives, in line with the Industrial Strategy Grand Challenges. The group will facilitate a cross-disciplinary exchange about the advantages of longevity within an ethical, citizen-centred framework, and develop practical guidance and recommendations for the UK government.

At the first Strategic Advisory Board Meeting, Rupert was invited to speak about OBH’s work identifying the ‘currently healthy’ population, and the measurement of outcomes for this specific population group. Whilst health and care systems have generally succeeded in prolonging life in recent years, a whole population, objective, system-level understanding as to whether or not these ‘extra years’ have been lived in good health has yet to be determined. Rupert conveyed the importance of metrics such as HEALTHSPAN and HEALTHY LIFESPAN INDEX in addressing the unsustainable rise of health and care costs. Such metrics are excellent markers of prevention and indicators of progress in achieving several key national targets.

COO Juliana to give a keynote speech at the HIMSS Hospitalar Forum in Sao Paulo, and joins Department for International Trade on a trade mission to Brazil

We are excited to announce that COO Juliana will be giving a keynote speech under the Health Analytics vertical on 24th of May 2019 at HIMSS Hospitalar focusing on “Digital Health – Prediction, Prevention and Precision Care”. She will share OBH’s experience in the UK and discuss the application of population segmentation and advanced analytics to measure HEALTHY LIFESPAN.. The event remains the most influential event in the Latin American healthcare segment, exhibiting over 1,200 companies and 85,000 delegates from 50 countries, discussing the latest innovations in health and care.

Whilst in Brazil, Juliana has also been invited to attend several meetings with key local stakeholders, facilitated by the DIT Brazil together with the UK Consulate in Sao Paulo. We are delighted for Juliana to have the opportunity to join another international mission, and would like to thank DIT Brazil for their ongoing support.

CEO Rupert speaks at IBM Watson event on AI and Data Analytics

In March, CEO Rupert spoke at the IBM Watson Health event on the role of Artificial Intelligence and Data Analytics in transforming healthcare.

Rupert discussed the importance of linking clinical, cost and operational datasets to ensure timely outcomes reporting, as well as how the unlocking of data could help achieve better, informed care decisions across pathways. He also emphasised the need to measure outcomes for healthy populations in addition to those who are already being treated for an illness, stating that this was an essential step forward in the proactive analysis required in order to effectively implement targeted prevention strategies.

The event, hosted at the King’s Fund and delivered in partnership with IBM Watson Health, discussed the latest opportunities that science and technology can bring to health and care, including their role in actioning the government’s focus on prevention outlined in the NHS Long Term Plan.