Digital Health Coffee Time Briefing ☕

Your morning summary of digital health news, information and events to know about if you want to be “in the know”.

👇 News

🤝 Doctronic, an AI native health platform, and end-to-end at-home healthcare platform Simple HealthKit, have partnered to ‘create a fully integrated care experience from engagement, screening to follow-up care’. Patients who consult Doctronic’s AI assistant about health concerns, such as STIs or chronic conditions including diabetes and kidney disease, can be connected to Simple HealthKit’s at-home testing programs, with test kits shipped directly.

👑 The chief executive of TEC Services Association (TSA), the national advisory body for the technology enabled care (TEC) sector, has been honoured by King Charles III in the 2026 Birthday Honours List. Alyson Scurfield was appointed an OBE in recognition of her services to the sector. She has led the TSA, which represents over 350 organisations that commission and provide TEC services, including councils, housing associations, care providers and technology suppliers, since 2013.

🤖 The initial wave of AI optimism is flattening and, in some areas, reversing, according to research from US customer engagement technology provider Smart Communications. A total of 46% of users see value in AI for health recommendations, an 8% year-on-year decline. The survey, which was conducted in June 2026, gathering insights from 4,000 consumers across the world, also found trust in AI’s ability to securely handle personal data remains fragile.

👨‍🔬 The UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) and US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have announced a programme to strengthen the regulatory partnership between the two nations. The programme will establish liaison officer roles within each organisation to enhance collaboration, support scientific exchange, and enable more coordinated approaches to emerging regulatory challenges and decisions.

🖊 Health Innovation Kent Surrey Sussex, Health Innovation Network (South London) and Health Innovation Yorkshire & Humber have partnered with BioSTL, a nonprofit organisation based in St Louis, Missouri, USA. The four organisations are now planning collaborations to share learning and to support UK innovators aiming to enter USA markets, as well as bring investors from the USA to the UK.

❓ Did you know that?

An AI forecasting tool that predicts the likelihood of clinical staff resigning, giving managers an early warning system to intervene before someone leaves, has won an AI award.

The Improving Staff Retention at the RBFT tool, developed by the University of Reading and the Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust (RBFT), also highlights the specific factors driving an individual’s risk of leaving, so HR teams can see why a prediction has been made.

It won the Aiconics AI Enterprise Business of the Year at the National AI Awards 2026 at a ceremony in London.

Professor Shixuan Wang, University of Reading, said: “This award reflects what’s possible when academic expertise in AI and forecasting is applied directly to a real problem facing the NHS. Our tool doesn’t just predict who might leave, it shows managers why, so they can act early and make a genuine difference to people’s working lives.”

RBFT employs around 7,500 staff and provides acute and specialist care across Berkshire, serving a population of around a million people. Like much of the healthcare sector, the trust has faced high staff turnover, which disrupts patient care and drives up recruitment and temporary staffing costs. Its existing HR processes relied on reactive reporting, meaning managers often only learned about retention problems after staff had already decided to leave.

📖 What we’re reading

A digital health expert has published a book that aims to help healthcare professionals confidently work with technology.

Christopher Tack, the author of Digital Health and Social Care: Byte-sized Wisdom says clinicians are increasingly expected to use technologies such as electronic patient records, interoperability solutions, AI, clinical decision support, population health tools, and digital transformation programmes – yet many receive little formal education in these areas during their professional training.

The book, published by Oxford University Press, aims to bridge that gap and provide an accessible introduction to the concepts, systems, and ways of thinking that underpin modern digital health and social care.

Christopher said: “My hope is that it helps students, clinicians, managers and aspiring digital leaders develop a practical understanding of the environment in which they increasingly work.

“My aspiration is for the book to become a useful educational resource for the next generation of nurses, doctors, allied health professionals, social workers, and healthcare leaders.”

🚨 Upcoming events

16-17 July 2026, University of Nottingham – Digital Health Summer Schools