NHS Social Innovation in Salford Competition

Before leaving to go on my trip I entered a competition being run by the NHS called "Social Innovation in Salford". The intention of the competition is to find people with ideas for how to solve some issues currently facing the NHS in the Manchester region.

The competition is split into several parts with the brief for the first part being:

How to give older people greater control and enable them to have more meaningful and fulfilling lives and in so doing reduce demand on the health and social care system

Its a really nice idea and a clever way to try to bring in new ideas to solve challenging problems that the NHS currently faces.

To enter you had two write a short (300) word proposal. If your proposal was short listed and you participated in the subsequent meetings you would win £1000.

My proposal was predictably related to technology and games. I suggested that mobile devices with games loaded on could be given to the elderly so they could keep their minds active by playing games. I also suggested that if tablets were used then other apps could be installed such as Skype that allowed the elderly to keep in contact with relatives.

During the early part of my trip I received an email announcing that I was short listed and invited to attend the meetings in Salford. Unfortunately because I was in North Carolina at the time I couldnt attend physically, instead they asked me to attend via Skype and create a video which details my proposal in more detail:

As a follow up, I was asked to create another video that answered some questions:

The leaders of the competition now have the option to select mine or one of the other proposals to take further and potentially develop it into an actual scheme.