Page 11 - Doing Data Together by The Scotsman

PROFESSOR STEWART MERCER AND STELLA CHAN
Day jobs Mercer: GP, professor of primary care and multimorbidity. Director of the Scottish School of Primary Care
Chan: academic clinical psychologist Project Soothe and Care: Promoting compassion and positive mood in Edinburgh and south-east Scotland to fight mental health issues exacerbated by Covid-19 lockdown
What was the specific aim of the project?
The pandemic affects all of us, but more so vulnerable people. Our researchers at the newly- established Advanced Care Research Centre are focusing on the well-being of those in later life and their carers.
In partnership with CogniHealth, our team is developing a new soothing feature hosted on their app, CogniCare – see cognihealth. uk/download –which is designed for carers.
There are many health and wellbeing apps, but this is unique as it is based on Project Soothe – at (www.projectsoothe.com –a long- standing research programme.
App users will have free access to a collection of soothing images, including landscapes, water
To learn more about these projects, visit ddi.ac.uk/projects/ ddi-covid-19-response-recovery-small-grant-funding
Will data support the move to allow more pregnant women to monitor their blood pressure at home – and offer a blueprint for collaboration to allow rapid change in health services? Picture: Shutterstock
features, animals, greenery,
and skyscapes. The images have been submitted and evaluated by members of the public from more than 40 countries. Users can swipe through the variety of images and even personalise what they see to reflect what they find relaxing.
Images are universal and
great communication tools, transcending age, culture, language and cognitive abilities. We believe these soothing images will resonate with everyone and bring a sense of calmness in today’s world. The soothing feature can
be enjoyed alone or shared with a loved one. Research suggests these images can improve your mood and help you feel more calm. Please let us know if you agree.
How might your findings assist future work?
Research shows that viewing 25 soothing images can positively influence mood. For the first time, this research is being implemented and made accessible to the public via an app.
We want to understand the long- term health benefits that this soothing feature has on people’s mood. Your feedback will be invaluable for our research and will shape its future development.
What was the specific aim of the project?
Our main aim is to generate evidence-based data-driven predictions of the effect of Covid-19 on the short- and long- term demands on primary health care and hospital resources
in Edinburgh and south-east Scotland.
What have you achieved?
We have created epidemiological models of Covid-19 dynamics for Scotland. These models represent individuals in the population and account for population structure – for example, age, social factors – and distribution at a range of scales down to the smallest census areas.
We have also developed computational statistical tools that match the dynamics of these models to the data and quantify parameters of the epidemic, and our uncertainty about them.
This approach is being applied
to publicly available Covid-19 data, and has been tested and validated using simulated data scenarios that show we can accurately recover variation in the reproduction number (the R-rate) before and
ANDREA WILSON
Day job Professor of infectious disease genetics and modelling, acting head of Genetics & Genomics Division, The Roslin Institute Project Data- driven now-casting
and forecasting of healthcare resource requirements associated with Covid-19 in Edinburgh and South-East Scotland
during lockdown, and quantify population level risk factors.
These models will be used to predict the impact of different interventions and associated healthcare needs.
How might your findings assist future work?
It will provide short-term predictions – “now-casts”– of Covid-19 incidence and associated resource demands for health services, and longer-term predictions (forecasts) based on anticipated Covid-19 exit strategies, which may result in new sporadic and localised flare-ups of cases.
These will help individual healthcare units and hospitals to distribute available resources, and governments to co-ordinate distribution across these units.
Optimal distribution of resources will not only mitigate devastating health effects, but also indirect side-effects on other physical and mental illnesses for which effective prevention and treatment is being impeded due to Covid-19.
In the longer term, we hope this will improve readiness for future epidemics.
MATJAZ VIDMAR Day job Lecturer, researcher and strategist, University of Edinburgh Project Impact of Covid-19 on high-growth businesses in Edinburgh city region and beyond
What was the specific aim of the project?
It was designed to capture the impact of Covid-19 on fast- growing data businesses in
the Edinburgh city region and their development of strategic resilience. It builds on a large survey of Covid-19’s impact on high-growth firms across the UK.
Edinburgh city region can
be particularly critical for post-Covid recovery, as it has a relatively high number of high- growth start-ups and early-stage businesses in the digital domain.
We have focused on the emerging New Space Sector, where data-intensive manufacturing and satellite data services companies have formed a cluster of activity translating academic research to successful products and services. We want to find out how they responded to the crisis in terms of threats
to employment/skills, disrupted finances, changing customer
and supplier relationships, and support for management and staff. Tracking these details is vital for informing local and national government, support agencies and managers to devise effective responses – and future-proof businesses against crises.
What have you achieved?
We have collected most of the
data from companies we planned to study. By and large,early findings show high-growth firms are in relatively good condition and have adjusted to the “new reality”. They quickly moved to homeworking (in some cases, proceeding with recruitment) and have only in limited cases used government support.
For many, this was an opportunity to reflect on and revise business strategy and operational management, and implement new policies and processes – including physical and mental health and
safety – often ahead of government advice.
There are, however, concerns with respect to government commitment to public R&D investment, and potential widespread economic fall out.
How might your findings assist future work?
We are planning to repeat the core survey with a follow-up
in autumn and next summer, directly informed by the findings of this study. We are also looking to build a core database with
the data, to track and engage companies beyond this crisis.
Critically, we hope to use insights to support high-growth firms in Edinburgh city region to emerge stronger than before.
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