ITECHO HEALTH LIMITED

Ascelus Real

This is real life implementation of digital platform with patient and clinician applications with some integration with hospital IT systems to improve monitoring and management in long-term conditions and patients recovering from coronavirus. Allows outpatient monitoring appointments to be eliminated or the number reduced, replacing these with ‘virtual clinics’.

Features

  • Patient and Clinician User Applications with customisable dashboard
  • Symptom Tracker
  • Appointment scheduling and reminders
  • Virtual clinics and video consultations
  • Vital Signs Tracker
  • Pathology results and trends
  • Medication reminders
  • Patient-clinician communication services
  • Patient Reported Outcome Measures (PROMS)
  • Some Integration with Hospital IT System

Benefits

  • More convenient for patients
  • Free up capacity for clinicians to see more complex patients
  • Reduced costs for commissioners
  • Secure simple applications to manage long-term condition
  • Improves communication between patients and clinicians
  • Uses existing clinical and admin systems, no separate scheduling
  • Reduced environmental impact (less visits to hospital out-patients)
  • Meets all NHS interoperability standards
  • Work with the hospital trust to customise the offering

Pricing

£30,000 a licence a year

  • Education pricing available
  • Free trial available

Service documents

Request an accessible format
If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need versions of these documents in a more accessible format, email the supplier at adrian@itechohealth.com. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.

Framework

G-Cloud 13

Service ID

9 9 2 0 6 0 4 5 3 8 3 8 6 6 0

Contact

ITECHO HEALTH LIMITED Adrian Brown
Telephone: 07843261566
Email: adrian@itechohealth.com

Service scope

Software add-on or extension
No
Cloud deployment model
Public cloud
Service constraints
Users require a supported web browser and minimum specification devices:
Video consultation requires a good internet connection (if patient can watch a video online for example with YouTube then this is sufficient) and
a private, well-lit area where you will not be disturbed during the consultation.
Software requires one of following: Google Chrome web browser on a PC desktop or laptop; Safari web browser on an Apple iMac, MacBook, iPad or iPhone or an Android tablet or smartphone. Device needs web-camera, speakers, and microphone already built in to laptop or mobile device or USB connected.
System requirements
  • Google Chrome web browser (Win7+, Android5.1+, MacOS 10.11+)
  • Apple Safari web browser (MacOS 10.12, iOS 11.4+)
  • A web camera (built-in or USB)
  • A microphone ( built in to laptop computers and devices)
  • Speakers or headset
  • A reliable connection to the internet greater than 192kbps rate
  • Laptop, tablet or a smart phone

User support

Email or online ticketing support
Email or online ticketing
Support response times
Operational hours (service hours) 24 x 7 x 365
Business support hours (service support hours) 8-6 Mon-Fri (except bank holidays)
User can manage status and priority of support tickets
Yes
Online ticketing support accessibility
WCAG 2.1 AA or EN 301 549
Phone support
Yes
Phone support availability
24 hours, 7 days a week
Web chat support
Web chat
Web chat support availability
9 to 5 (UK time), Monday to Friday
Web chat support accessibility standard
WCAG 2.1 AA or EN 301 549
Web chat accessibility testing
We have test scenarios using an official WCAG2.1AA guidance and we are doing internal testing. no outside audit has been conducted yet.
Onsite support
Yes, at extra cost
Support levels
Itecho Health provides training for first line and second line support teams and then takes the 3rd line support calls. We also assist nominated Primary Support Contacts once a range of common, typically local, causes have been ruled out.

If an issue cannot be resolved locally, or by the customer organisation's IT support using the resources available, Itecho Health provide a service desk that nominated Primary Support Contacts can access.
Support available to third parties
Yes

Onboarding and offboarding

Getting started
We provide training to the clinical team, online videos and user documentation. For patient community online videos, chat support and user documentation is available on the application
Service documentation
Yes
Documentation formats
  • HTML
  • PDF
End-of-contract data extraction
Clinical data will integrated and populate the hospital Electronic Patient Record. On contract expiry the data can be downloaded in CSV format for up to 30 days following contract expiration.
End-of-contract process
Extraction of data , any support needed for transition and any queries in the transition period are included in the price. Any request over and above standard data extraction will be at an additional cost

Using the service

Web browser interface
Yes
Supported browsers
  • Internet Explorer 11
  • Microsoft Edge
  • Firefox
  • Chrome
  • Safari
Application to install
Yes
Compatible operating systems
  • Android
  • IOS
  • MacOS
  • Windows
Designed for use on mobile devices
Yes
Differences between the mobile and desktop service
No material difference except that layout changes to suit the screen format
Service interface
Yes
User support accessibility
WCAG 2.1 AA or EN 301 549
Description of service interface
All service and administration is accessed via the management console web page. This is accessed by the original administrator who can delegate access.
Accessibility standards
WCAG 2.1 AA or EN 301 549
Accessibility testing
Itecho Health has a vision of digital health accessible for all. A formal accessibility assessment has not been conducted on the most recent version of the management console. The console employs components that have accessibility support as outlined in web content requirements.
API
Yes
What users can and can't do using the API
Most configuration aspects of the Ascelus Real Web Application can be accessed via the API.
Developers can enable their applications or integrations to access the API using credentials with the appropriate access levels to the target configuration. HTTPS REST calls with JSON payload are supported.
API documentation
Yes
API documentation formats
  • Open API (also known as Swagger)
  • HTML
API sandbox or test environment
Yes
Customisation available
Yes
Description of customisation
Itecho Health's approach is to ensure that Ascelus Real is customised to individual conditions and for individual services whilst using a core platform to minimise the time and cost to make changes. We use a co-design approach with clinicians and patients/carers to ensure that our products meet user needs and expectations. To add a new disease area Itecho Health need to customise the symptom tracker and pathology tests needed and risks stratification needs to be changed according to the hospital clinical policies. Surveys and bespoke PROMs can be also be added. For minor changes customers can quickly customise many aspects including branding, messaging provided to patients, support contacts, patient information, opening hours, service URL and post consultation evaluations.

Scaling

Independence of resources
Ascelus Real is a AWS based platform and has mechanism built-in to increase capacity based on increase in usage.

Analytics

Service usage metrics
Yes
Metrics types
Total number of patients actively using the application;
number of face to face appointments saved;
total number of clinicians using the application;
dashboard of service status and uptime of application and
any other bespoke reports needed.
Reporting types
  • API access
  • Real-time dashboards
  • Regular reports
  • Reports on request

Resellers

Supplier type
Not a reseller

Staff security

Staff security clearance
Other security clearance
Government security clearance
Up to Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS)

Asset protection

Knowledge of data storage and processing locations
Yes
Data storage and processing locations
United Kingdom
User control over data storage and processing locations
Yes
Datacentre security standards
Complies with a recognised standard (for example CSA CCM version 3.0)
Penetration testing frequency
At least every 6 months
Penetration testing approach
Another external penetration testing organisation
Protecting data at rest
Physical access control, complying with CSA CCM v3.0
Data sanitisation process
Yes
Data sanitisation type
Deleted data can’t be directly accessed
Equipment disposal approach
Complying with a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v.30, CAS (Sanitisation) or ISO/IEC 27001

Data importing and exporting

Data export approach
Users assigned Administrator or Reporter roles for Customer Organisation, have access to standard reports in CSV format aggregated for all of their assigned entities, via the web application interface.
Data export formats
CSV
Data import formats
CSV

Data-in-transit protection

Data protection between buyer and supplier networks
TLS (version 1.2 or above)
Data protection within supplier network
TLS (version 1.2 or above)

Availability and resilience

Guaranteed availability
The service availability is based on the aggregate SLAs of the service components from the underlying cloud hosting provider. This is 99.95%.

No refund scheme is currently in place.
Approach to resilience
The system is provided as a resilient, high availability service.
Underlying infrastructure is provided by accredited cloud providers, with redundant and resilient internet connections and local utilities.
The system is designed for continuity with resilience to both site and component failures.
Redundant sets of components are deployed into geographically-separated sites. These redundant components are configured for cross-communication, so that if a component fails in a given zone, its functions will be fulfilled by surviving components in another site.
The design is scalable with additional component units able to be added for resilience and capacity.
Outage reporting
The following outage reporting methods are employed:
- Publicly Accessible Service Status Dashboard on the patient app, clinician app will show the outage
- API available for individual component status
- Email alerts to nominated Customer Contacts

Identity and authentication

User authentication needed
Yes
User authentication
  • 2-factor authentication
  • Username or password
Access restrictions in management interfaces and support channels
New users need to be registered to our Ascelus system as a valid user, once the user is registered they need to use two factor authentication to sign in
Access restriction testing frequency
At least every 6 months
Management access authentication
  • 2-factor authentication
  • Username or password

Audit information for users

Access to user activity audit information
Users contact the support team to get audit information
How long user audit data is stored for
At least 12 months
Access to supplier activity audit information
Users contact the support team to get audit information
How long supplier audit data is stored for
At least 12 months
How long system logs are stored for
Between 1 month and 6 months

Standards and certifications

ISO/IEC 27001 certification
No
ISO 28000:2007 certification
No
CSA STAR certification
No
PCI certification
No
Cyber essentials
Yes
Cyber essentials plus
No
Other security certifications
Yes
Any other security certifications
Cyber Essentials

Security governance

Named board-level person responsible for service security
Yes
Security governance certified
Yes
Security governance standards
CSA CCM version 3.0
Information security policies and processes
A comprehensive set of policies covering implementation and management controls across the following aspects: Access and Authorisation Control; Network and Data Encryption; Network Ingress/Egress; Centralised Event; Logging and Alerting; Systems Hardening; Data Protection and Retention; Intrusion Protection/Detection; Malware and Virus Protection; Patch Management; Solution Design Assurance; Vulnerability Assessment; Incident Management and Solution and Systems Development

Systems design and implementation documentation is delivered to the standard required for effective realisation of security controls. Security Controls implemented in technical domain are unit and integration tested for impact and effectiveness. The IT Operations Manager is responsible for ongoing monitoring of systems and procedural aspects relating to security policy enforcement and or detection of exceptions and/or violations. An ISO compliant Documentation Control System is used. Internal Policy Approvals are the responsibility of Senior Management team including the CTO and CEO.

Operational security

Configuration and change management standard
Conforms to a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v3.0 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
Configuration and change management approach
The Software and Systems development lifecycle is mature with clear boundaries between phases and activities and individual assignment and accounting for activity at each phase.

Quality Assurance Scope and test case specification and execution are tracked and reported in functional and regression testing.

Continuous Integration, Continuous Delivery and Test automation is in place to ensure repeatable, consistent and robust deployment.

Role separation for QA sign-off, authority to deploy and deployment execution.

All software and systems development steps are tracked in issue management system which incorporates approval gates and sign-off of impact, risk and rollback steps.
Vulnerability management type
Conforms to a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v3.0 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
Vulnerability management approach
Infrastructure and application assurance, employs a suite of standard security testing tools.

Regular external-facing testing is performed to ensure infrastructure attack surface-area complies with the design and deployment specifications.

Server configuration and software versions are audited against currently-known vulnerabilities.

Application server systems protection with an automated system vulnerability assessment and virtual patching providing automatic update of protection modules for newly discovered vulnerabilities even before operating system or vendor patches are available.

The application hosting environment is audited for any inadvertent misconfiguration.

Third-party-contracted testing is performed in concert with key stakeholders.
Protective monitoring type
Conforms to a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v3.0 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
Protective monitoring approach
Web Application Firewall with comprehensive OWASP Top 10 coverage

On host intrusion protection and detection system: Alerts are configured so that system administrators are informed when events occur which require immediate action or investigation. Major event alerts trigger delivery of email. Critical events trigger alert via AWS SNS with higher priority email and SMS to designated phones.

Daily Reports are delivered to System Administrators which cover: summary of all system and subsystems events; all firewall events; all integrity monitoring events and all log inspection events.

Identified incidents are correlated with system wide log/events.
Incident management type
Conforms to a recognised standard, for example, CSA CCM v3.0 or ISO/IEC 27035:2011 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
Incident management approach
Responsible support staff are alerted to intrusion detection, component failures and above threshold metrics.

A Service Desk is available for logging of incidents, with ticket confirmation reported via email.

Incident resolutions are logged and add to knowledge base for most effective future responses.

Centralised log collection and analysis allows rapid analysis of system errors or attack vectors and forensics.

Post Incident Review will be conducted with root cause analysis reported to CTO.

The CTO is responsible for reporting and rectifying security weaknesses and instigating control improvements based on lessons learned.

Secure development

Approach to secure software development best practice
Conforms to a recognised standard, but self-assessed

Public sector networks

Connection to public sector networks
No

Social Value

Fighting climate change

Fighting climate change

Ascelus Real helps to reduce CO2 emissions. To capture real-world evidence the patient don't travel to the clinics, we help to increase compliance along with CO2 reduction
Covid-19 recovery

Covid-19 recovery

We support reduction of waiting list by using remote management of patients

Pricing

Price
£30,000 a licence a year
Discount for educational organisations
Yes
Free trial available
Yes
Description of free trial
We can work with the clinical team to organise a trial period or pilot to demonstrate the effectiveness and usability of the service. We can include patients and clinicians in the trial. The trial is for an initial 30 days with extension following mutual agreement.

Service documents

Request an accessible format
If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need versions of these documents in a more accessible format, email the supplier at adrian@itechohealth.com. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.