South West Anaesthesia Research Matrix

Following her winning pitch at the Hive of Ideas at the 2017 SWARM AGM, Dr Anna Ratcliffe is Chief Investigator of this NIAA funded CRN portfolio project.

Wearable accelerometers are novel technology to measure activity, including mobilisation, and sleep. AFAR is a pilot study which aims to assess the feasibility of accelerometer methodology to measure the success of perioperative care from the patient perspective, objectively and in the natural environment.  We aim to gain experience with this technology, and test a methodology that could be deployed at scale across our SWARM research network.  

We will be using an open-source wrist-worn triaxial accelerometer (activity AX3), developed by the Open Lab a computer research group at Newcastle University, with whom we will also collaborate for data analysis.  

We hope that this collaboration will not only work towards the development of a novel tool to measure quality of recovery, but also be an introduction to the application of artificial intelligence and machine learning in medical research for SWARM..

Plymouth and Truro completed recruitment of their target number of patients over the summer of 2019 - as of September 2019 we are awaiting a few to complete their 3 month follow-up wear periods before reporting on the project.

Chief Investigator and Plymouth Principal Investigator: Anna Ratcliffe.

Truro Principal Investigator: Juan Graterol.

Truro Co-Investigator: Sam Spinney.

Trainees involved in delivering AFAR at Plymouth: Sophie Howell; Felicity Miller; Deborah Webster; Pushpa Veeralakshmanan.

For more info contact Anna Ratcliffe (anna.ratcliffe@nhs.net)