Innovator profile: Medwise.ai Helping doctors find the answer, Dr Keith Tsui, CEO and Co-founder of Medwise.ai, explains how Eastern AHSN has helped it develop a reliable, trusted clinical decision-making tool based on a search engine for clinicians B eing a medical doctor is extremely rewarding. Each day can challenge you with new experiences and helping find the right diagnosis for patients is like solving a puzzle. However, the body of evidence is constantly growing and keeping up with the latest guidance can be an overwhelming task. A 2010 study found that medical articles are appearing at a rate of at least one every 26 seconds1. Working on the frontline, I was frustrated at having to rely on paper books and sometimes contradictory sources when looking for clinical information. Thats what gave me the idea for Medwise.ai. Our web app aids clinical decision-making by using AI-powered search across all relevant UK guidelines in a simple question and answer format to provide concise answers to clinical questions. Having attended a few of Eastern AHSNs clinical innovator events and being so impressed by its understanding of digital healthcare solutions, I knew that we needed to apply to present Medwise.ai to its Innovation Review Panel in 2020. We knew our platform could be a vital tool in helping healthcare professionals find information relating to COVID-19 as the clinical community tried desperately to keep abreast of the research relating to this relatively unknown condition. The AHSN agreed and helped us develop our value proposition, as well as supporting a successful grant application from Innovate UK to develop our prototype to support frontline services during the pandemic. Given how early we were in our journey, a full-scale clinical trial was not viable, but we received incredibly valuable mentoring from experts with both digital and clinical experience and Eastern AHSN conducted an independent user survey and a health economic evaluation to understand the impact. The evaluation found an estimated average time saving of 2.6 minutes per 10-minute consultation, leading to a potential annual cost saving of 20 million for the NHS. There were further recommendations to extend the platform into other disease areas. We knew our platform could be a vital tool in helping healthcare professionals keep abreast of the latest research We were thrilled to be shortlisted in the rare diseases innovation challenge that Eastern AHSN ran in partnership with the Cambridge Rare Disease Network (CRDN). By their nature, rare diseases can be very difficult to diagnose, so we hope that by connecting healthcare professionals with reliable and current information this may help people living with a rare disease find a diagnosis sooner. We presented Medwise.ai at the CRDNs RAREsummit21 event in October, where delegates voted Medwise.ai as the solution that best met one or more of the challenges set. We have since been introduced by Eastern AHSN to organisations including the NHS Genomic Medicines Service Alliance for potential collaborations. In March 2022, we launched a pilot of Medwise.ai across three clinical commissioning groups within the Suffolk and North East Essex (SNEE) integrated care system to help clinicians navigate the growing body of evidence and guidance in treating patients diagnosed with Long COVID over 12 months. As well as helping broker the pilot and giving project management support, Eastern AHSN has agreed to fund an evaluation to determine its impact on patient outcomes and service efficiency. We are also in talks with secondary and tertiary providers across England and were awarded a 311,000 Innovate UK Smart Grant to expand our platform into secondary care settings, which we hope will evidence that we meet NHSx Digital Technology Assessment Criteria (DTAC) standards. This will really help simplify NHS procurement of Medwise.ai and Im really excited about where the future may take us. Two years after I attended my initial clinical innovator event, I was invited back, but this time as a speaker to proudly tell my story and support tomorrows innovators. To be a successful innovator you need to start with a problem that you are passionate about and persevere with solving it. Keep the patient or end user in mind and find the right support to help challenge you and shape your idea into something that makes an impact. For us, Eastern AHSN has been that trusted partner. Share this article Return to the contents page Visit Medwise.ai now to find out more and register for an account Do you have a great idea that could make a positive health impact? Find out how Eastern AHSN can support you at https://www.easternahsn.org/ innovators/ Up next: Read about our work convening the mental health community across Cambridgeshire and Peterborough to develop a values-based approach to treating persistent depression. References 1 Garba, S., Ahmed, A., Mai, A., Makama, G., & Odigie, V. (2010). Proliferations of scientific medical journals: a burden or a blessing. Oman medical journal, 25(4), 311314. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3191655/