Kenny Macleod is a children’s asthma doctor and based at the Children’s Hospital in Edinburgh for the past 9 years. He works in a team of asthma nurses, doctors and physiotherapists and for a long time and has passion to improve how we look after children with asthma.
“We get most worried about the patients who find it very difficult to take their regular treatment and for various reasons find it difficult to get to clinic appointments. We know that certain patients are at higher risk of an asthma attack but we only find out about them once they’ve already had an attack. We would like to be able to predict who is at greatest risk before the event. We also know that asthma attacks can at least be disruptive and difficult, but at worst they are a preventative cause of death. The idea of being able to predict who is going to have an attack and do something about it could make a huge difference to children and young people with asthma.”
Currently Kenny is working on a way to get accurate data on the current state of children in our area. With an aim to use the data to work out a way to combine available clinical data from various sources and integrate into hospital management systems. This can then alert clinicians when an individual is at increased risk of an asthma attack. Having begun a discovery phase of this project with the help of innovation experts at HISES, the data knowledge at DataLoch (Dataloch.org) and the systems and analysis expertise of Lenus (lenushealth.com) the aim is to use machine learning to enable a new way of caring for asthma patients.
Kenny enjoys cycling round Edinburgh (when the weather is good!). He recently went interrailing around Europe with his family. Much needed rest, with incredible memories making him refreshed and ready to take on the challenge ahead for the Women’s and Children asthma project
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