Following a pilot with Bradford Teaching Hospitals, New York-based TytoCare is to deliver virtual care to patients at 14 of the UK’s NHS organisations.

TytoCare provides an all-in-one modular device and examination platform for AI-powered, on-demand, remote medical exams.

Its expanded partnership with the NHS will see the deployment of TytoCare’s telehealth across 14 organisations and 26 projects in Yorkshire and Humber, including Leeds Children’s Hospital, Sheffield Children’s and nearly 70 care homes. The integration of TytoCare into the NHS’s current virtual care offerings will allow clinicians to diagnose and treat patients remotely with in-depth, physical examinations during video visits. The device will also be used offline for asynchronous exams.

After receiving CE Mark approval in 2018, TytoCare and Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust partnered the following year to carry out remote examinations for chronic paediatric respiratory patients, paediatric patients with ENT conditions, as well as paediatric palliative care. Bradford was the first trust in the UK to partner with TytoCare and the pilot received a commendation from the HTN Health Tech Awards for most promising pilot.

Starting with the success of the Bradford pilot and building on the accelerated adoption of digital health during the Covid-19 pandemic, NHSX, a joint unit of the Department of Health & Social Care, NHS England and NHS Improvement, initiated a joined-up care programme to accelerate the scale of using digital innovations to transform patient care. The expansion is being implemented in various use cases, including care homes, remote patient monitoring, post-discharge care, paediatric virtual wards and respiratory care.

“We are honoured that the NHS has chosen to implement our telehealth across NHS trusts,” said Dedi Gilad, CEO of TytoCare. “TytoCare delivers convenient and accessible healthcare without compromising quality, all from the comfort of home. We look forward to continuing our work with the NHS to expand its incredible telehealth programmes across the UK.”

At Leeds Children’s Hospital, TytoCare is being used by the cleft lip and palate team, where cleft nurses can take high quality images and videos of babies’ mouths in the maternity unit and when they visit the baby at home for follow ups. The images are then reviewed by a surgeon for diagnosis, the planning of surgical options, as well as post-op follow up, all virtually without the need for the baby and their family to travel to outpatient appointments.

Doctors at Sheffield Children’s are using TytoCare devices for the NHS FT Home Ventilation Virtual Clinic to undertake physical checks on community visits and facilitate online remote consultations and examinations. Sheffield Children’s plans on deploying the TytoCare devices to its NHS FT Paediatric Palliative Care Team so more children and families can benefit from enhanced virtual support at home, avoiding travel to and from the hospital.

Almost 70 care homes and their linked primary care medical practices are also deploying TytoCare. Due to the pandemic, care homes are limiting in-person doctor visits and consultations to reduce the risk of transmission to residents and, due to high demand for primary care, doctors are also looking to reduce travel time to and from the homes.

TytoCare offers care homes enhanced capabilities for virtual consultations, enabling physicians to facilitate a more thorough level of clinical assessment and better clinical decision making, without the need for an in-person assessment of the patient every time. Additionally, this enables care homes to treat more patients, including those in rural areas, in a more cost and resource effective manner.

The integration of TytoCare also empowers care home staff to support the healthcare needs of their residents, while improving the residents’ experience through better managing their health needs in the home.

The Yorkshire & Humber Academic Health Science Network (AHSN) has been working closely with TytoCare, increasing its knowledge of and relationships within the health sector to support the adoption and spread of the technology across the healthcare system. After noticing it during its initial pilot in Bradford, the Yorkshire & Humber AHSN advocated for it to be part of NHSX’s joined-up care programme.

“We’re thrilled to provide TytoCare to 14 different trusts, across 26 projects, ensuring patients are getting the best possible care,” said Kate Lodge, head of strategic partnerships at Yorkshire & Humber Academic Health Science Network. “New digital tools like TytoCare help to design services around individual patient and family needs as well as reduce the need for hospital visits and admissions. We look forward to continuing our journey of digital innovation with TytoCare, providing opportunities for many individuals, from babies to the elderly with comprehensive virtual care, as well as giving clinicians the tools needed to safely care for, diagnose and treat more patients remotely.”

Following the roll-out of these and other TytoCare projects, additional NHS trusts and clinical commissioning groups across the UK are integrating TytoCare into their virtual care pathways.

Co-founded by Dedi Gilad and Ofer Tzadik in 2012, TytoCare has FDA and CE clearances and has partnered with over 150 major health systems, health plans and strategic partners in the USA, Europe, Asia, Latin America and Israel.