Foreword: Welcome

Foreword

Foreword Welcome We are delighted to present our annual impact review for 2021-22, which tells the story of the work we have done with our partners in the NHS and industry to bring about positive impact for patients, staff and the wider health and care community. Looking back over the year, we are particularly proud that we have maintained our levels of partnership working with our colleagues in the NHS, despite the demands on them arising from the continuing pandemic, including the vaccine rollout and variant strains of the virus. Weve also been closely involved in supporting the recovery of elective services and the NHSs drive to provide care remotely through technology. Weve also been busy creating connections and supporting innovators and industry partners to help develop and embed proven innovations into services so they can benefit patients. We supported 849 companies across the UK and internationally, including more than 2,500 hours of support to innovators to help them turn their great ideas into positive health impact. A core theme that runs through this review and our impact from this year is our work on real-world evaluation, building on our expertise in identifying promising solutions and convening the right partners to deliver transformation, while measuring its impact and learning lessons for more effective adoption and spread. This involves sophisticated analysis and judgement, and we are seeing increasing demand for our services in this context. This can be seen in the programme we are delivering in partnership with the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration East of England (NIHR ARC EoE) to evaluate how remote monitoring can track a wide range of conditions at home, and whom it can help most. Our strong relationships with the NIHR ARC and other local partners have seen integration at a leadership level, Innovation implies developing an invention to the point where it catches on because it is sufficiently practical, affordable, reliable and ubiquitous to be worth using Matt Ridley, How innovation works, 2020 with members of our senior management team in joint roles with the ARC. Although this review focuses on our impact from 2021/22, it tells the story of an ongoing collaborative effort to build and sustain partnerships to deliver better outcomes for our patients. This includes a wider strategic emphasis on improving population health, addressing health inequalities and supporting the cultivation of an innovation culture within the developing integrated care systems. These stories are largely told by the people we have worked with. We would like to thank all our partners for their continued efforts, engagement and commitment, without which we wouldnt be able to achieve our impact. Whether you are a healthcare professional, an innovator, an academic, a citizen or a combination of the above, we hope that this impact review tells our story and evidences how we are convening the right people to turn great ideas into positive health impact. Piers Ricketts Tracy Dowling Chief Executive Chair Keep up to date with Eastern AHSN by subscribing to our newsletter here