University of Sheffield TaCT, CATCH and RAT Best of 2015!

January

The Dementia,Cognition and Care Collaboration, held its final workshop. RAT Group’s Professor Gail Mountain and others facilitated a day focused on how to involve people living with dementia, and their relatives/supporters, in research.

The MALT study team launched their toolkit of resources for telehealth implementation and adoption. All of the tools are available via the MALT website. You can also view a short animation via this link.

February

The Speech Therapy Apps for Rehabilitation (STAR) project started in February. The project is funded by the NIHR Invention for Innovation programme and is a collaboration between the University of Sheffield, Therapy Box Ltd, Barnsley Hospital and Devices for Dignity.

Prof Arlene Astell

March

CATCH Professor Arlene Astell attended the WHO's first ministerial conference on dementia.

Research involving RAT group's Prof Gail Mountain and Dr Nasrin Nasr featured in Business Weekly on the 11^thMarch, 2015:University of Hertfordshire scientists are part of a European team that have developed a prototype of a robotic glove which stroke suffers can use at home to support rehabilitation.

Adopt a Care Home Evaluation was showcased as part of the Festival of Science and Engineering.

April

Dr Jack Parker, Prof Gail Mountain & Prof Sue Mawson published a paper in the Physical medicine and Rehabilitation international journal entitled “The provision of feedback in community stroke rehabilitation: the therapist’s perspective”

May

May 27^th 2015 marked the first Technology for Healthy Ageing and Wellbeing (THAW) event bringing together the general public with those in the NHS, councils, charities and industry to discuss if technology could be used to help older people to lead happier healthier lives.

From the left; Sheila Kennedy,
Martyn Lewis, Deb Tanner,
Tom Downs & Libby Archer.

Sheila Kennedy took part in a radio discussion about a Department of Health funded research project aiming to improve acute hospital care for frail older people. 

Dr Katherine Easton collaborated with Inkwell Creative Arts Media, a volunteer led enterprise offering media solutions and services, to produce a short animation that explores the use of technology in mental health.

Dr Sarah Smith

 

June

Staff from the Centre for Assistive Technology and Connected Healthcare (CATCH)spoke and exhibited at the prestigious annual King’s Fund Digital Health and Care Congress

 

July

TaCT's Dr Matt Dexter facilitated a 24 hour Design Challenge: "As a facilitator, I had the luxury of watching the whole event unfold without having to dive in and do the tough job of creating a meaningful piece of Participatory Design over a single day."

Launch of the first Telehealth and Care Technologies Newsletter

Professor Gail Mountain presents "Old Wine, New Bottles" at Design 4 Health Conference.

Sarah Smizz's excellent interpretation of Professor Mountains talk.

August

100 participants were recruited into the multi centre trial "Big CACTUS" led by RAT Groups, Dr Rebecca Palmer.

RAT Groups Sarah Hargreaves graduated with their PhDs. 

September

TaCT supported a short term secondment of Occupational Therapist Ali Madden-Fitzgibbon, from the Assessment and Rehab Centre and Sheffield Health and Social Care NHS Foundation Trust. Ali was placed with the ‘Valuing Active Life in Dementia’ (VALID) research team in Sheffield, to develop her research skills. Ali's secondment has now come to an end.

October 2015

CATCH's Sarah Smith had her PhD confirmed.

Simon Judge (right),
Medipex Awards.
Image taken fromMedipex website.

Researchers test cutting edge technology with stroke and arthritis population: TaCT Theme members tested innovative technology that feeds back on the way people walk with those post stroke and arthritic knee pain groups.

Simon Judge was a joint winner of the digital health category at the Medipex Innovation Awards.

RAT, and CATCH presence at the AAATE 2015 conference in Budapest.

 

November 2015

The TaCT EnComPaSS project made a strong impact at the Hospice UK national conference in Liverpool

December 2015

Sam Kyeremateng (Medical Director, St Luke's Hospice, Sheffield and Consultant) and Judith Park (deputy chief executive and director of patient
care at St Luke's Hospice Sheffield, Chair of executive clinical leaders in hospice palliative care group) from St Luke's Hospice present at the Hospice UK2015 Annual Conference.

The Adopt a Care Home scheme was featured on Channel 4 News. Laura Di Bona and Sheila Kennedy are involved in the development of this scheme and carried out an evaluation of it. The scheme links people with dementia in care homes to local children.

Dr Claire Craig gave a keynote highlighting the importance of design in healthcare. 

Dr Liz Williams and Prof Arlene
Astell accept their award

A CATCH project team was amongst the nine Sheffield Smart Lab winners that were announced at an awards ceremony in Sheffield. The CATCH project team that was successful was Novel Assessment of Nutrition and Ageing or NANA for short. NANA, led by CATCH academics Prof Arlene Astell and Dr Liz Williams, is a system that monitors the nutritional intake and cognitive function, mood and activity of older adults.