Cholesterol testing pilot

As part of a wider Cardiovascular Disease Prevention Programme, HI NENC delivered a pilot cholesterol testing programme trialling innovative cholesterol test, PocDoc. The pilot came to an end in June 2024 and is currently undergoing an evaluation.

Aim

The aim was to identify people at risk of heart attacks and strokes using an innovative cholesterol test. This allows testing for lipids to move out of GP surgeries, dramatically increasing access to testing. In turn, this aims to prevent more people from developing cardiovascular disease.

Delivery across the North East and North Cumbria

The pilot focussed on increasing access to cholesterol testing outside of a traditional GP surgery environment. This included testing at-home, on the high street, workplaces and in other community settings.

High risk patients in deprived communities and those who are less engaged with GP services across the region were a key priority during the pilot.

Benefits

We are currently evaluating the pilot project and will share full findings later in 2024. Before launching the pilot, we anticipated the following benefits:

• The pilot aims to ease pressure on GPs, reduce hospital admissions, and increase healthy life expectancy by making cholesterol testing easier, more accessible, and more cost-effective.
• We expect the pilot to deliver cost savings by shifting testing away from GP practices and into more accessible settings. A health economic evaluation, which is part of the pilot, will explore this in more detail.
• PocDoc improves access to testing by removing barriers for people who are less engaged with GP services. Research has shown that one of the main challenges of engagement in long-term cardiovascular management is the requirement for frequent cholesterol testing—often involving multiple healthcare visits.
• Evidence shows that people living in the most deprived areas of England are four times more likely to die early from CVD compared to those living in the least deprived areas. By improving access to testing, we aim to help address this health inequality.

The pilot programme was funded by the Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) for Healthcare, the System Transformation Fund (STF) and Innovation for Healthcare Inequalities Programme (InHIP).