Executive chairman of InnoScot Health, Graham Watson, offers insights into the ‘smart hospital’ approach to healthcare delivery

If we are to successfully make the leap to a more-efficient, more-sustainable NHS which provides improved care, then technology is undoubtedly a key enabler for helping to futureproof services.

Specifically, innovation embedded within increasingly-advanced data-driven frameworks is making for a strong and effective combination which can realise both short- and long-term gains while ushering in next-generation healthcare shaped firmly around the individual.

Leading that charge, and representing the start of a new era, ‘smart hospitals’ take a holistic approach to technology adoption, connecting clinical systems with digital and physical assets to form a unified, wholly-integrated system underpinned by real-time information.

Smart hospitals are not bricks and mortar spaces. Part of their tech-driven ethos – and the very essence of ‘smart’ – is ensuring that care can be provided outside of physical hospitals, reducing unnecessary visits and time to respond through the delivery of telemedicine interventions and remote monitoring technologies.

The smart hospital has advanced to become a concept much larger than that of what was once envisioned as an efficient, highly-optimised building

Smart hospitals are as much about patient empowerment – encouraging individuals to be actively engaged with their own health and wellbeing – as technological innovation.

Indeed, the smart hospital has advanced to become a concept much larger than that of what was once envisioned as an efficient, highly-optimised building.

Now, the concept is bringing ‘smart’ to the core of health service delivery itself – and is without borders.

The smart hospital is quite simply wherever the individual wishes to receive healthcare.

From an NHS workforce point of view, it helps to automate administrative workflows and enhance productivity while reducing errors.

This highly-automated approach, now boosted further by the introduction of artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics, increasingly represents a core function of the smart hospital, informing and co-ordinating the likes of patient monitoring, surgical procedures, and diagnostic imaging while extending to 3D-printed tools, smart medicines, and personalised therapies.

Three key aims

Ultimately, the smart hospital as we now know it in 2025 is about three key transformational aims – enhancing the patient experience, lowering costs, and alleviating workforce pressures.

Physical hospital facilities are still required, of course, but they are increasingly being reserved for critical interventions and complex needs.

Within those physical spaces, ongoing transformation remains important, too.

Indeed, smart operating theatre technologies are positively changing the way the NHS works, making for more-efficient and sustainable approaches which are achieving better patient outcomes and helping to tackle waiting lists.

Across NHS Scotland, theatre scheduling breakthroughs are maximising facilities and reducing downtime; environmentally-friendly innovations are helping to reduce theatre waste and support ambitious net zero targets; while high-resolution screens and robotic surgery technologies are supplementing human expertise when it comes to complex, precision-led procedures.

Laying foundations

Smart theatre technologies are further ensuring that energy usage is optimised and are laying strong foundations for rolling out a leaner, greener health service for generations to come.

We know that the NHS must embrace digital tech across its full estate for a more-sustainable, joined-up future, but the operating theatre is where that can arguably be best harnessed and exemplified in the here and now for both patient and staff gain.

Smart operating theatre technologies are positively changing the way the NHS works, making for more-efficient and sustainable approaches which are achieving better patient outcomes and helping to tackle waiting lists

Only recently, Scotland’s First Minister, John Swinney, pledged that ‘better use of data will ensure that more operating theatres are working at maximum capacity, with best-practice approaches, shown to increase productivity by 20%, rolled out across the country’.

Aligned with that ambition, we have seen a surge of exciting breakthroughs taking place in recent times across NHS Scotland, many of them spearheaded by the workforce’s forward-thinkers.

Innovation identified by the knowledgeable, insightful Scottish health service workforce can be a huge asset in achieving much-needed progress.

Making a difference

Indeed, those who work in operating theatres, and are immersed in the challenges and opportunities inherent in that environment, are best placed to spot where positive differences can be made.

Staff can undoubtedly play a vital role by identifying where the integration of smart technologies would be of most benefit.

No wonder then that NHS Scotland is actively investing in inspired ideas originating from its workforce.

Last year, it was announced that clinician-led, cloud-based software from Infix Support – founded by NHS Golden Jubilee consultant anaesthetist, Dr Matthew Freer, in 2019 – had won an NHS Scotland contract to optimise operating theatre efficiency following a competitive procurement process.

Backed by five years worth of NHS operating times data, the development of a more-intuitive system for operating theatre optimisation is considered to be a game-changer, and Infix: Schedule is now being rolled out across Scottish health boards.

It is a timely step, with NHS staff continuing to face challenges in reducing surgical operating lists amid a clear need to significantly increase efficiency.

Infix successfully piloted its Schedule software across three health boards, enabling operating room efficiency to be improved by up to a quarter and the completion of thousands of additional operations.

Infix: Schedule’s ability to standardise scheduling workflows, simplify processes, and reduce unnecessary downtime has meant increased productivity, removal of paper processes, and reduction of administrative burden when applied to the creation and approval of theatre lists.

Integration

The ethos is straightforward – recognising that new technology must integrate within existing systems across all health boards while aiming to change ingrained behaviours in order to optimise existing resource and facilities.

Equally transformative tech has been developed by InnoScot Health spinout, CardioPrecision – a Glasgow-based company focused on less-invasive treatment of structural heart disease and cardiothoracic interventions.

Three out of four cardiac centres in Scotland are now using its innovative technology during heart surgery for better patient outcomes, with positive results continuing to be reported.

The centres are using CardioPrecision’s CoreVista on-screen system for precise Endoscopic Vessel Harvesting (EVH) – a minimally-invasive procedure that makes only a small incision during surgery, creating faster recovery times, less time spent in hospital, reduced pain, less blood loss, and a lower risk of infection.

InnoScot Health believes that the NHS Scotland workforce must be considered vital to implementing and overseeing smart transformation as the health service workforce becomes more technologically and sustainably focused

The system brings a screen into the operative field within direct sight and control of the EVH operator, making EVH faster to learn for new operators, providing more-comfortable working conditions for seasoned operators – avoiding sick leave from neck and back strain injury – and enabling more-efficient equipment setup.

Last year, CardioPrecision also played a leading role in bringing the world’s-first robotic aortic valve replacement through a tiny incision in the neck significantly closer to reality.

The company was able to demonstrate a proof-of-concept Advanced Videoscopic Aortic valve surgery by Transcervical Approach using Robot-assistance (AVATAR) procedure in Chicago, introducing it to leading US robotic surgeons.

The procedure was performed successfully on a series of human cadavers, representing an important milestone in progressing towards clinical cases.

Leading the way

The Robot Enabling Platform opens up the groundbreaking possibility of daycase aortic valve surgery – a massive step forward in the field; and mirrors advances in robotic surgery systems being explored across multiple treatment areas.

In a Scottish context, it will be important to free up NHS investment to enable the benefits of smart hospitals to be fully realised.

It is certainly the global direction of travel, with consultancy, Deloitte, forecasting that the smart hospitals market will be worth $148bn by 2029 with industrial giants like GE Healthcare Technologies and Honeywell International expected to lead the way in advanced diagnostics and monitoring systems.

InnoScot Health believes that the NHS Scotland workforce must be considered vital to implementing and overseeing smart transformation as the health service workforce becomes more technologically and sustainably focused.

We want to inspire that vital push as much as possible by lending our support to health service staff, encouraging them to become agents of change.