Untitled Page

Go Back

Below you can explore some illustrations of just how different parts of the NHS continue to lead the way.

To lead the way in treating chronic illness, we’re letting our patients get on with their lives.

To lead the way in infection control, our mobile unit is giving us a clean break.

To lead the way in medicine distribution, we’re making science fiction into science fact.

To lead the way in treating cancer, we’re virtually there already.

To best manage the population’s investment, we’re leading the way in world class procurement.

To lead the way in intensive care unit efficiency, we’re following in the footsteps of a prancing horse.

To lead the way in fighting climate change, our bus service is just the ticket.

To lead the way in getting smokers to quit, we’re seeing how much they can puff away.

To lead the way in tackling obesity, our Body Volume Index is taking a real weight off our shoulders

Our Technology Adoption Centre is leading the way in leading the way.

Go Forwards

To lead the way in treating chronic illness, we’re letting our patients get on with their lives.

To lead the way in tackling obesity, our Body Volume Index is taking a real weight off our shoulders.

Already, a quarter of the British population is classed obese, causing around 9,000 premature deaths every year in England alone. The estimated cost of this problem to the NHS is £4.2 billion every year. These figures could double by 2050 if no action is taken to tackle this problem. The NHS is already implementing a number of measures to treat people suffering from obesity-related problems – but our challenge now is to prevent people from gaining excessive weight in the first place.

One of the initiatives we are currently undertaking is carrying out detailed research into a ground-breaking body mapping system which is leading the way in analysing the shape of the human body in far greater detail than ever before. The Body Volume Index (BVI) calculates the distribution of body weight, allowing us to see exactly where fat collects on an individual’s body. It has the potential to replace the Body Mass Index (BMI), which in the past has been criticised as an inaccurate measure of obesity, relying solely on patients’ height and weight measurements.

In a recent trial, a 19-year-old rower measuring 6ft 2ins was given a BMI of 28, putting him at the top end of the overweight category. In his BVI scan, however, it was found that he actually carried very little fat, and that his weight was largely due to muscle. According to fitness trainer Matt Roberts, “Muscle weighs more than fat does. And you can hide away fat but be quite thin looking. So it’s important that we don’t just use BMI alone.”

This new body mapping technique could help NHS clinical staff catch the warning signs of obesity-related problems early on, allowing them to prevent the patient’s condition from progressing further and leading to potentially fatal conditions such as diabetes and heart disease. Researchers at Birmingham Heartland’s Hospital have also found that people lose “significantly more weight” when their progress is measured using BVI.

The next phase of testing, spanning two years, plans to calculate the BVI of at least 20,000 people as part of the Body Benchmark research project.