Avricore Health Inc. announced its successful integration of HealthTab™ the Company’s cloud-connected, pharmacy-based platform for testing and health data management, with Patients Know Best (PKB), the UK’s leading patient personal health record (PHR).
The new partnership enables a seamless connection between real-time diagnostic results from pharmacy point-of-care testing and PKB’s PHR platform, enhancing data accessibility for patients and healthcare providers alike. Supporting HealthTab’s pilot with North East London, an existing PKB customer, this collaboration marks a significant step forward in advancing the government’s shift to community based screening and a more preventative approach to healthcare.
With 4.8 million registered users and contracted to serve 20 million individuals across the UK, PKB has the deepest PHR integration with the NHS App, supporting a more unified health data experience for patients and giving their healthcare team visibility into full patient records for more seamless care. Patients and healthcare providers have access to detailed information such as appointment letters, medication lists, test results, allergies, care plans and discharge information.
HealthTab™ is a turnkey point-of-care testing platform designed to support the evolving role of pharmacists and empower patients to take control of their health through better access to actionable health insights. Utilising proprietary data interpretation, this end-to-end solution makes screening and managing chronic and infectious disease in the community pharmacy fast, accurate and reliable. Having tested tens of thousands of patients, it has demonstrated that this powerful solution in the hands of pharmacists leads to significant improvement of patient outcomes.
In the summer of 2023, HealthTab™ was selected as the service provider for point-of-care testing and data management for an exciting initiative aimed at expanding chronic disease care in UK pharmacies. Barts Health NHS Trust in collaboration with UCLPartners, NHS North East London, the North East London Local Pharmaceutical Committee, and Heart UK, focuses on offering cholesterol screening in North East London.
This groundbreaking rapid lipid testing service, launched publicly in November 2024 as part of the East London prevention strategy, provides real-time, accurate clinical data to pharmacists, doctors, and patients powered by HealthTab™. It complements the NHS Community Pharmacy Blood Pressure Check Service, enabling earlier identification and management of individuals at risk of cardiovascular disease.
Integrating HealthTab™ results with PKB accounts aims to seamlessly incorporate patient test outcomes into their personal health records within the NHS. On the back of the results, the pharmacy software provides the patient with a care plan stored in their PKB record for easy reference, supporting behaviour change. This integration fosters interoperability between health professionals to enable better collaboration, improved clarity in patient care and more effective use of critical health data. Also, by centralising information, it empowers both patients and healthcare teams to make better-informed decisions, enhancing the overall quality of care.
“Every public health system must make early detection and intervention the core focus of combating chronic disease,” said Hector Bremner, CEO of Avricore Health. “Through screening and monitoring of chronic disease in pharmacy, in collaboration with clinicians through easier access to data like this, we believe the NHS will save billions while also saving lives.”
“This is the future of preventative healthcare - where patients can monitor and manage their health proactively. This is also the future of workforce sustainability as the patients benefit from pharmacy capacity and reduce GP workload. The partnership will ensure they can use data with their healthcare team to better manage their outcomes,” said Mohammad Al-Ubaydli, CEO and Founder of Patients Know Best. “By linking point of care screening and monitoring in pharmacy to the health record, the patient and professionals will become a team working towards a clear goal.”
"We were keen to ensure that our Point of Care Testing initiative in community pharmacies across North East London adds value to the wider healthcare system. A key aspect of this was ensuring visibility of results for all relevant healthcare professionals as well as giving patients ownership. The collaboration between HealthTab and PKB empowers patients by integrating their test results into the NHS app, making them accessible to any healthcare professional involved in their care. This also supports the journey of community pharmacists towards becoming prescribers and managing long-term conditions. With patient consent, pharmacists can access additional health records, enabling them to make informed and appropriate prescribing decisions,” says Dr Sotiris Antoniou, lead investigator at Barts Health NHS Trust.
HealthTab and PKB have successfully concluded the API connectivity and are happy to report that testing has shown a clear and quick path for patients to sign up, get connected and begin their testing. Ongoing collaborative efforts between the companies will be done to identify ways to encourage patient engagement and demonstrate clearly that patients and their pharmacist are a successful healthcare team as the programme rolls out nationally.
