Ulla Hellstrand Tang, PhD student at the Institute of Clinical Sciences, is one of thisa year’s recipients of Västra Götaland’s internal environmental scholarships. She gets SEK 10,000 for her e-health tools D-Foot and E-system, which are used to save resources and evaluate the sustainability of preventive measures in health care.
Ulla Hellstrand Tang is as a PhD student in charge of a multidisciplinary work on a new E-health tool for the prevention and treatment of foot complications in diabetes. The tool provides structured screening and registration to prevent foot ulcers and amputations.
– As it is now, not everyone high-risk feet are offered adequate care. A fact which results in intractable ulcers that may take months or years to heal or that result in amputation, says Ulla Hellstrand Tang, who see the environmental award as an acknowledgment to her and her colleagues work in the right direction, and that it is supported by the region’s highest political ledning.
The app “D-Foot” is an orthopedic engineer’s tool for risk grading at the foot examination. The app is born from a regional research cooperation and provides treatment recommendations based on regional and national guidelines, all with the aim of promoting foot health and prevent foot ulcers and amputation. The actions recommended are orthopedic treatment, pedicure, annual inspections and access to multidisciplinary team (at established injury). Research has shown that structured prevention and treatment leads to ulcers or amputations can be halved in number, which also results in a significant profit.
Ecological footprint
In addition, the concept collects other key set. For example, the ecological footprint of different treatment options is calculated.
-In one of our studies, we collect data from the patient on how he or she traveled to the orthopedic department. We also produced data on energy consumption and costs for the orthopedic treatment. After processing the key figures in a calculation we could estimate the ecological, economic and social effects of different treatment options, says Ulla Hellstrand Tang.
The objective is to seek to minimize the ecological footprint of the greatest benefit for the 400 000 people with diabetes in Sweden. At the global level applies to the 382 million people worldwide with diabetes.
