The Innovation and Design Programme (iDP) was privileged to have Professor Chng Wee Joo, Vice-Dean for Research the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine and Group Director for Research at the National University Hospital System (NUHS), and Ms Grace Chiang, Chief Campus Planning Officer of Alexandra Hospital (AH), share with iDP students the Singaporean healthcare landscape and challenges, and how innovation can play a part in addressing these challenges.
Professor Chng began his presentation by highlighting the increased chronic disease burden, healthcare expenditure faced by an ageing population, as well as the key strategies driven by the Ministry of Health that centred around the themes of going “beyond hospital to community, beyond quality to value, and beyond healthcare to health”. He then shared the areas of research effort and innovation that can be of great interest and value for clinicians and engineers to collaborate. This includes leveraging robotics, AI, data analytics, diagnostic, and regenerative technologies to create MedTech devices or inventions for fall prevention, early detection of disease, and improving elderly mobility. In fact, some of the local innovations were timely pivoted and deployed to solve challenges created by the Covid-19 pandemic. Ending his part of the presentation, Professor Chng highlighted 2 ongoing innovation-themed joint activities between NUS Medicine and Engineering faculties. Namely, the “Medical Grand Challenge” and “Engineers in Medicine” programs. While the former targets students and the latter involves faculty members (young clinicians and engineers), he encouraged students to explore and participate as much as possible.
For the second half of the webinar, Ms Chiang went further to share about healthcare delivery in Singapore. In particular, how Alexandra Hospital, with its upcoming campus, will be driving new models of care and transforming healthcare. A deep dive into the changing care needs and issues facing patients, clinicians, caregivers, and community were discussed. She also outlined focused areas where Alexandra hospital intends to seek innovative solutions. For example, problem statements in the Emergency Department’s operation, patient interaction experience, “reimagining hospital workspace” in consideration of pandemic requirements, realising “the connected ward” concept, and becoming a “pandemic-resilient & ready” hospital, etc.
The Innovation and Design Programme would like to thank both speakers for an insightful and thought-provoking session.
