Industry Spotlight: David Jehring, chief executive, Black Pear Software

Wes Streeting’s vision for the 10 year health plan has been Black Pear’s “direction of travel” all along, says David Jehring. 

David Jehring is one of a rare breed of digital health pioneers who knows exactly what it takes to make technology deliver for patients.

“A lot of clinicians go into IT, but they don’t necessarily have any technical skills to understand the art of the possible. That’s what I bring to the table,” he says.

A graduate of one of the first medical schools with a health computing centre (University of Birmingham), he computerised the practice where he trained to be a GP in the 1980s and went on to design the first Windows GP clinical system in the UK.

Today, clinical insight and digital execution are in the DNA of Black Pear Software, the company Jehring founded in 2009. Black Pear’s live, interactive care plans are automatically populated by data from the patient’s GP record – with other data added over time – and accessible to clinicians across the NHS.

Integrated with primary care

The plans’ accessibility and “unique” integration with primary care data make them a model for the digitally enabled NHS of the 10 year health plan, says Jehring.

He points out that Wes Streeting’s “vision” in the plan – fully interoperable systems that empower patients – is more than a good fit for Black Pear. “It’s been our direction of travel all along. And it’s not as if we are dreaming visionaries without the capability. We can do this stuff at scale.”

A standout example of the Black Pear approach is the end of life care plan (ReSPECT), developed for Bristol, North Somerset, and South Gloucestershire (BNSSG) Integrated Care Board. The plan uses Black Pear’s Core platform to unite GP, community, hospice and acute services around a single, real-time write-back record. In an emergency requiring an ambulance, paramedics can instantly access the patient’s ReSPECT plan to ensure that their care preferences are respected, avoiding unwanted and costly hospital admission.

From 1,613 patients with closed plans this year, 68% have died at home, compared to the national average of 28%. Only 12% of patients died in hospital; the national average is 43%.

“People died at home who would otherwise have died in hospital, simply because we made data available at the right time,” says Jehring. “Ambulance crews had the information to say ‘no – this patient doesn’t need to go to hospital’.”

Jehring suggests his entire career has been about “me following the march of Technology and trying to find out, when a new wave comes along, how we can use it to the best effect”.

With his first company, Apollo, he used advances in informatics and analytics to write the first national diabetic audit.

But arguably the turning point in his career – an event that led directly to his decision to move on from Apollo (still a very successful company today) and set up Black Pear – had, on the face of it, nothing to do with the NHS or health IT.

I fervently believe that the best person to curate their data and be in control of their data is the patient

“I saw Steve Jobs launch the iPhone in 2007 and I thought, ‘this has to be the next big thing’. We had rich data in GP practices, but the minute you left the practice you had access to nothing.

“The iPhone was clearly a way of taking GP data and mobilising it and putting it not only in the hands of wandering clinicians, but also into the hands of patients. That’s been my passion.

“I fervently believe that the best person to curate their data and be in control of their data is the patient.”

Jehring and his team wrote some of the first healthcare software for iPhone, as well as a mobile GP system, Health File.

“We licensed that out and it became Vision Anywhere – the first mobile GP system,” he explains.

The Black Pear senior team have scored an impressive run of ‘firsts’. As well as the first live read-write access to leading GP clinical systems, Black Pear was the first to adopt HL7 FHIR in the UK (and among the first in the world), and the first to use the public cloud to exchange medical data.

Jehring says having the support of his talented team (most of them clinically trained) has been one of the “privileges” of his career. Some colleagues have been with him for 25 years. It was Black Pear’s chief technology officer Dunmail Hodkinson, “an IT guru” who still works as a paramedic, who spotted the potential of the emerging standard HL7 FHIR before most people had heard of it. His foresight meant Black Pear “wholeheartedly adopted FHIR”.

Unlocking the power of data

Today, Black Pear’s unique integration, Core Access, unlocks the power of primary care data – making live HL7 FHIR connectivity available in minutes and enabling every authorised system to share and update a single, trusted version of the truth.

We produce something that is of use, rather than just reams of information that is difficult to distil

But Black Pear offers more than technology. As well as a “deep understanding” of the data in the plans, “we also understand the uses of those data”, says Jehring. A paramedic will have different priorities to a hospice consultant, so the same plan provides each with a personalised snapshot.

“We produce something that is of use, rather than just reams and reams of information that is difficult to distil,” Jehring says.

He argues that the 10 year health plan’s digital aspirations are “entirely achievable” – but only if the NHS looks beyond the “usual suspects” for its IT and puts “trust” in small, local UK suppliers.

“AI is changing at a phenomenal pace. You need people who are small, agile and innovative.

“The biggest threat to the 10 year plan is that it will get swallowed up in bureaucracy and procurement,” he adds.

One of his current projects is to produce a platform that will support people at risk of diabetes to eat, exercise, sleep and balance their mental health in a safe and effective way using an AI digital assistant.

“We’re busy writing that at the moment for the trial later in the year. It’s called Elevate. It’s the kind of model that the new NHS will be using.”

Despite his frustration with the NHS procurement system, Jehring has no doubt that Black Pear will be involved in delivering the 10 year health plan and “may end up with a big contract”. The capability is there – and the good will.

“We’re a well-liked organisation and we’ve got customers that value what we do.

“My hope is that Black Pear will be able to deliver a significant part of the functionality [of the plan], giving patients curation over their own data in an intelligent way that’s useful for them and their clinicians.”

Contact Black Pear Software:

Website: www.blackpear.com
David Jehring via LinkedIn: David Jehring
Chris O’Connell via LinkedIn: Chris O’Connell
Email Chris O’Connell: chris@blackpear.com