In mid-May private healthcare company Babylon Health was awarded its third contract by a hospital trust for use of its Ask A&E triage tool. The contract with the Royal Berkshire Foundation Trust is for 12 months and will cost the trust an undisclosed amount.
An article in the HSJ, notes that this could be the beginning of a longer term partnership similar to the previous two agreements with the Royal Wolverhampton FT and University Hospitals Birmingham FT.
Patients can input their symptoms into the Ask A&E tool now available online via the trust’s website. It will provide advice to the patient based on symptoms, which could be visiting A&E, calling an ambulance, seeing a GP, or staying at home and monitoring symptoms.
The system does not differ much, if at all, from the current NHS 111 service, which in the trust’s area is provided as part of an integrated urgent care service by South Central Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust (SCAS) in collaboration with Berkshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust, Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust and Buckinghamshire Healthcare.
Full story in The Lowdown, 8 June 2020
