More than one million children in the UK currently receive treatment for asthma. The estimated financial burden of asthma on the NHS is at least £1.1 billion. Acute asthma attacks remain a leading cause of unplanned hospital admissions, emergency visits and missed schooldays.
‘Albus Home’ is a contactless automated bedside table-top device. Employing advanced signal processing and AI algorithms, the multi-sensor platform monitors a range of physiological metrics and indoor environmental metrics. This enables continuous, objective and accurate monitoring for any patient to identify an asthma exacerbation earlier. The HIOTV team conducted a feasibility study to assess the clinical needs, user requirements and perceived usefulness of the Albus Home monitoring device in the severe asthma pathway for children.
Stakeholders identified several potential key benefits of implementing the contactless and automated Albus Home device for asthma monitoring including improved patient outcomes and improved patient experience. A clinical study is currently running at two leading paediatric asthma centres, Birmingham Children’s Hospital and the Royal Brompton in London, to collect evidence and data for evaluating the performance of the Albus system. Health Innovation Oxford and Thames Valley will carry out a health economic analysis once clinical study data is collected to support the adoption of the Albus Home device in the paediatric severe asthma pathway.
