About HELIX
The new HELIX Centre for Design in Healthcare is a joint collaboration between the Royal College of Art (RCA) and the Institute of Global Health Innovation (IGHI) at Imperial College London.
Its vision is to transform healthcare using design, making the UK a global business hub for low cost and high impact innovation.
Innovation in healthcare can come at a high price. In the developed world it is often characterised by costly and high tech initiatives, where ideas can take a decade to deliver from concept into a clinician’s hands. HELIX will use design to solve everyday problems in healthcare, focusing on low cost solutions which can be adopted more quickly by health systems. Everything the centre does will be firmly rooted in patient care – based out of St Mary’s Hospital its sole focus will be on design that directly improves the care that patients receive
The Centre will bring together clinicians, academics, technologists and venture capitalist expertise with NHS staff to develop innovations with global application. Recognising that some of the promising technologies in healthcare are developing outside the UK, HELIX will work collaboratively with international academic and commercial partners such as Stanford University, Singapore University of Technology and Design the IDEO and TATA in India to develop ideas and create commercial opportunities for our best designs.
The Centre will use its research strengths and diverse networks to explore how design in health care can enhance patient care including meeting the needs of an ageing population, improve clinical outcomes and prevent or mitigate against disease.
The RCA and Imperial College London have had a strong history of collaboration. A recent collaborative project – the London ambulance redesign – won both the UK Design Museum’s transport Design of the Year in 2012.
Launching in November 2013 and embedded in a clinical environment, the HELIX centre will focus on frugal innovation or high impact, low cost design. Encouraging a culture of innovation in the NHS, HELIX will run an extensive programme of training, workshops and seminars in innovation and entrepreneurship for healthcare staff. HELIX will educate the next generation of design focused leaders through the development of a Masters in Biodesign and Doctoral research programmes and work with established international partners to support wider dissemination and commercialisation of products.