Aptus Home - Usability Study
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Using Aptus Home - measuring haemoglobin at home.
IRAS ID
262222
Contact name
Chris Burrows
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Entia Ltd
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 3 months, 31 days
Research summary
Anaemia is a substantial health economic burden to the UK health system
with an estimated £30m spent each year managing just Iron-Deficiency Anaemia patient groups in primary care (£80m across primary and secondary). Many patients are readmitted into the healthcare system after treatment with recurrence of anaemia. Self-management of anaemia presents an opportunity to dramatically reduce annual expenditure by empowering patients to manage their condition without direct healthcare intervention. In light of recent health economic data, Entia Ltd recently received government funding to explore new cost-effective interventions that can simultaneously improve quality of life.Entia has taken the underlying technology from Aptus to develop Aptus Home, a home-based monitoring system for anaemia. Entia has developed Aptus Home with lay users over a 12 month period using a co-design process. This has been done through regular focus groups to identify pain points in current anaemia treatment and identify and design out usability problems identified with the prototypes of Aptus Home. Participants in the co-design have trialled Aptus Home prototypes and pre-manufacturing products in the home and provided regular feedback on usability problems to Entia.
A previous study, Aptus Home, REC ref 17/EM/0479; IRAS number 233542, confirmed that the service co-designed with anaemic participants has the following benefits:
Time-saving (waiting time for appointments, time off from work to attend GP appointments).
Identifies serious reduction in haemoglobin earlier, enabling more timely treatment.
Reduces check-up visits to GP surgeries and outpatient blood testing services.
Empowers patients to monitor anaemia at convenient and relevant times (i.e. during menstruation).REC name
London - Stanmore Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
19/LO/0973
Date of REC Opinion
30 Jul 2019
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion