Panellists left to right: Humza Yousaf – Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care, Sue Webber – Conservative Member of Scottish Parliament for the Lothian region, Tom Steele – Board Chair at Scottish Ambulance Service, Chris Carrigan – Expert Data Adviser to use MY data, Professor Dame Anna Dominiczak – Chief Scientist (Health) for the Scottish Government, Chair: Angela McFarlane – Vice President, Strategic Planning, North Europe at IQVIA
Innovating Healthcare Scotland gathered a panel of experts to discuss how we can improve innovation in healthcare and life sciences. Considering the need to involve the NHS and the many hoops scientists have to jump through to acquire funding for life-saving research, leaders offered perspectives on ensuring the provision of resources to empower medical professionals.
This is the first of three articles we are publishing on this event, you can find the others here and here.
Introducing a highly qualified panel of experts across various divisions of Scottish healthcare and addressing the challenges facing the NHS in Scotland, Angela McFarlane, Vice President, Strategic Planning, Northern Europe at IQVIA, initiated a discussion on improving life sciences policy in Scotland.
This session was oriented around previously submitted and live questions for a fruitful conversation around the future of life sciences policy. The audience were asked how confident they are that Scotland will continue to attract global life sciences investment, including clinical trials. The majority appeared to range from somewhat to very confident.
Promoting Innovation Through The NHS
The first question to the panellists was put forth by General Manager of NHS Research Scotland, Charles Weller, who asked how we can best engage with NHS staff to promote innovation.
Humza Yousaf, Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care appointed in 2021, was immediate about being upfront and honest about the reality of the situation. “I don’t think we have fully grasped the opportunity that life sciences and innovation can unlock for us in terms of immediate and future challenges for public health,” he said.
As for how to do so, Yousaf acknowledged that “the leadership has got to come from the top, from the government, the chief executives, from our chairs, its got to come from our organisations like the [Centre for Sustainable Delivery (CfSD)] ” Ultimately, what is needed is to make sure that health service buys into the vision of what we’re trying to do.”
He stated that what most people in the industry, academia, and the NHS are trying to do has a common aim: “bettering people’s health, and confronting those health challenges, not just now but those future health challenges.” Continuing, he said: “So, we’ll do lots of things around fellowships, we’ll do partnerships with industry, but actually, we’ve got to take the NHS with us on the journey, and the way we do that is by ensuring that they are bought into the vision.”
Based on his ability to see things from the patients’ perspectives, Tom Steele, Board Chair at Scottish Ambulance Service, outlined three things “without which we will not achieve” and that are crucial to involve the people:
- Leadership, including senior leadership and leadership throughout the NHS.
- Involvement, according to Steele, “involvement of everyone.”
- Empowerment for those on the frontline to make the changes they aspire to.
Steele said that in his discussions with frontline clinicians, a key appetite for change is there. Nevertheless, having the empowerment, time and resources to do this, proves difficult. Thus, he affirmed that this has to be something that is backed by both political and operational leadership across the 14 territorial boards in the NHS.
Decision-Making for Life-Saving Research
Speaking about the bureaucratic challenges of acquiring necessary funding for life-saving research, Alexander Mullen, Professor of Pharmacy Practice at the University of Strathclyde, asked how that process could be made seamless.
Addressing Mullen’s specific example of research that could prevent drug-related deaths if adequately funded, Sue Webber, Conservative Member of Scottish Parliament for the Lothian region, admitted that this issue is “more than a challenge, a shame.” Webber highlighted the importance of being “creative and innovative in how we tackle this.”
Establishing her role as Shadow Minister for Drug Policy as one of “applying pressure to her counterparts,” Webber discussed the need for hastening and pushing the decisions that could save lives. “It’s important that we hear from all the good practices out there that could be used right now to save lives. It’s very important that we’re aware of that.”
“It’s a travesty if we lose out on technology that could be saving lives. End of,” Yousaf agrees firmly. The appropriate checks and balances are necessary when issuing public funds; however, “there should be one place that you go to, that one place should do all the due diligence, come to government with a recommendation, and then we should just be able to get that done and dusted relatively quickly, one way or the other.”
Addressing Mullen, Professor Dame Anna Dominiczak, Chief Scientist (Health) for the Scottish Government, agreed that this issue required attention. She appreciated the efforts being made by Members of Parliament. Referring to Webber and Yousaf, Dominiczik said: “here you have two people with a common eye who are trying very, very hard to build systems [and an] approach, an end-to-end approach, to evaluate innovation, that are transformational.”
Final Thought
After some challenging discussions on innovation through NHS and research funding and decision-making, another poll question was asked: “how confident are you that the vision for 2025 and the wider life sciences strategy for Scotland is achievable?” Most audience members answered in the affirmative that they were somewhat to very confident.
The panellists concurred that decision-making and the involvement of the NHS must be optimised. Medical professionals and academics have the will and the potential to engineer and administer technology that could save lives but are hindered by the lack of empowerment and bureaucratic processes. Chamber UK’s honest conversation and many suggestions, combined with public optimism, illustrate the potential for improving healthcare in Scotland.