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Health and Care Infrastructure Research and Innovation Centre (HaCIRIC)

Lead Research Organisation: Imperial College London
Department Name: Imperial College Business School

Abstract

Modernising the UK's health and social care system is a priority for government and for the country as a whole. To do this, wide ranging organisational and funding reforms are being put in place. An unprecedented investment to renew the built and technical infrastructure for delivering care is also underway: new hospitals and primary care centres are being built, information and communication technology is being upgraded and new technologies for diagnosing and treating disease are being introduced. If world-class infrastructure is to be delivered, this investment must achieve its full potential. The aim of HaCIRIC is to establish a new research centre to help accomplish this. HaCIRIC's focus is on the built and technical infrastructure for health and social care, and the interaction between infrastructure specification and the way patients are treated. Improving the way this is planned, delivered and managed is at the core of HaCIRIC's activity. What are the challenges? The health and social care system is one of the most complex and rapidly changing organisational and technical environments in any sector of the economy. Many stakeholders are involved in delivering care, funding mechanisms are convoluted, and patterns of demand and use are changing, as are government health policies. All this places new pressures on the underlying infrastructure. These are compounded by two problems. First, there is an historic legacy of out-dated buildings and cultures within the care system. Second, the life cycles of the various elements of the infrastructure / buildings, medical and information technology / are mismatched. Each involves complex supply chains, multiple users with their own needs and differing institutional and funding arrangements. All these have to be reconciled. For example, the current PFI programme for new hospitals involves supply contracts for thirty years or more, but incorporates technologies which have five year life cycles to help deliver diagnostics and therapies which are undergoing rapid evolutionary change. Modernising the health and social care infrastructure will therefore require innovative approaches. HaCIRIC will help develop the tools and processes which will embed 'innovation as normal business' amongst those responsible for delivering the investment in infrastructure. Its research programme has been developed in partnership with all the key stakeholders from the care system, including the Department of Health, the NHS, the Department of Trade and Industry and the supply industries. Seven research themes have been identified:- Managing innovation in a context of technological change- Procurement for innovation- Innovative design and construction- Care delivery practices- Delivering improved performance through operations management- Knowledge management in complex systems - Design and evaluation of integrated systems HaCIRIC is a collaboration between existing research centres at Imperial College London and the Universities of Loughborough, Reading and Salford. Additional partners from other universities, industry and the care system will be involved in specific research projects. Together this represents a resource valued at more than 11m, of which 7.0m consists of EPSRC support, 2.9m is from the four existing research centres, 500,000 is from the Department of Trade and Industry and 720,000 is from industrial partners. HaCIRIC will therefore represent a substantial resource and a unique capability in skills and knowledge to find solutions to the key healthcare infrastructure problems of the 21st century.

Organisations

Publications

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Rooke C (2010) Using the physical properties of artefacts to manage through-life knowledge flows in the built environment: an initial exploration in Construction Management and Economics

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Rooke J (2011) Models and metaphors: complexity theory and through-life management in the built environment in Architectural Engineering and Design Management

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Barlow J (2011) Raising the profile of simulation and modelling in health services planning and implementation. in Journal of health services research & policy

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Hendy J (2012) The role of the organizational champion in achieving health system change. in Social science & medicine (1982)

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Malik D (2013) The inactivation of Bacillus subtilis spores at low concentrations of hydrogen peroxide vapour in Journal of Food Engineering

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Malik DJ (2013) On the difficulties of isolating Clostridium difficile from hospital environments. in The Journal of hospital infection

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Jayanti A (2013) Barriers to successful implementation of care in home haemodialysis (BASIC-HHD):1. Study design, methods and rationale. in BMC nephrology

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Shama G (2013) The uses and abuses of rapid bioluminescence-based ATP assays. in International journal of hygiene and environmental health

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Oliveira TC (2013) Teleconsultations reduce greenhouse gas emissions. in Journal of health services research & policy

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Cartwright M (2013) Effect of telehealth on quality of life and psychological outcomes over 12 months (Whole Systems Demonstrator telehealth questionnaire study): nested study of patient reported outcomes in a pragmatic, cluster randomised controlled trial. in BMJ (Clinical research ed.)

 
Description For copy of final programme report and details of all (c.300) publications please visit www.haciric.org or contact Prof. James Barlow
Exploitation Route see programme final report, available at www.haciric.org
Sectors Construction

Healthcare
URL http://www.haciric.org
 
Description For copy of final programme report and details of all (c.300) publications please visit www.haciric.org or contact Prof. James Barlow
First Year Of Impact 2014
Sector Construction,Healthcare
Impact Types Societal

Economic