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News

Preliminary Market Consultation (Innovation): Diabetes Care – Remote HbA1c Monitoring, Overcoming the logistical issues and developing innovative care pathways

Published on
24 January 2023

The Scottish Government Scottish Health and Industry Partnership (SHIP) wish to engage with interested suppliers in the marketplace prior to a future Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) to develop disruptive innovative solutions that deliver sustainable, accessible and equitable remote HbA1c self-testing.

Preliminary Market Consultation (Innovation): Diabetes Care – Remote HbA1c Monitoring, Overcoming the logistical issues and developing innovative care pathways

The Scottish Government Scottish Health and Industry Partnership (SHIP) plan to launch a future Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) to develop disruptive innovative solutions that deliver sustainable, accessible and equitable remote HbA1c self-testing. This will include the development, distribution and return of self-collection blood sample kits with instructions on self-phlebotomy for patients and integration of the results within the current NHS infrastructure.

At this stage further dialogue with possible industry partners is desirable. As part of this Preliminary Market Consultation process, we wish to engage with interested suppliers in the marketplace. To aid the process suppliers are asked to answer a brief questionnaire. For further details including the questionnaire template please access the following link and register your interest:

DO NOT SUBMIT YOUR QUESTIONNAIRE RESPONSE TO SCOTLAND INNOVATES WEBSITE. ALL QUESTIONNAIRES MUST BE SUBMITTED VIA THE NOTICE POSTBOX ON PUBLIC CONTRACTS SCOTLAND.

Overview

The 2020 Scottish Diabetes Survey showed there are 317,128 people living with diabetes in Scotland. This represents 5.8% of the population. 10-15% of healthcare budgets are spent treating diabetes, 80% of costs being due to preventable complications. The survey showed 16,430 new type 2 diabetes diagnoses; however, it is estimated that around 10% of cases of type 2 diabetes remain undiagnosed. Diabetes Scotland also estimates that over 500,000 people in Scotland are at high risk of developing type 2 diabetes (T2DM). Detecting diabetes and optimising glycaemic control is paramount in improving diabetes related healthcare, societal and personal costs.

The challenge themes are:

  1. Data driven approach to risk stratification and prioritisation: Identification of a clinically meaningful patient population at risk of T2DM or with existing diabetes in whom at home HbA1c may help support a virtual/hybrid care model.

  2. Demonstrate an effective user-friendly self-collection blood test kit, validation of the sample quality and analytical performance. This includes the ability to distribute to identified patients ensuring linkage within the request of sample to patient, return for analysis and instructions for use of test and return of samples.

  3. Demonstrate viable service for distribution of self-collection kit to patients and return to a UKAS accredited laboratory (ISO15189) or by a UKAS accredited point of care testing facility (POCT) (ISO22870) method for analysis. Either the sample or the result to return to NHS laboratories for integration within the patient record.

Once established, this solution could be utilised for testing in primary prevention and other aspects of chronic disease.

Eligibility

Please note that this notice is for Preliminary Market Consultation for pre-tender supplier engagement only. A date for the Pre-Commercial Procurement Notice for a future competition is to be advised. Applications are welcome from any type of organisation of any size (registered in the UK, EU or EEA) that can demonstrate a credible and practical route to market. Successful Applicants for the Pre-Commercial Procurement will be able to work in partnership with a research partner site to serve as the 'test bed' to develop the innovation and to collect real-world evidence in support of future potential product approval and use across the NHS Scotland health system. When the Pre-Commercial Procurement Notice for this competition becomes available, interested parties must make a separate application for this on the Public Contracts Scotland.