Linking technologies to better detect disease: apply for funding

The lives of many patients could be improved with better and earlier diagnosis of disease and the development of improved treatments that exactly meet their needs.

Businesses and researchers in the UK are being encouraged to work together to look at how diagnostic systems could be integrated to improve detection and diagnosis of disease and to deliver more personalised medicine.

This competition is part of the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund’s £120 million Data to Early Diagnosis and Precision Medicine Challenge.

The challenge aims to fund researchers and industry to combine data and real-world evidence from UK health services and create new products and services that diagnose diseases earlier and more efficiently.

Innovate UK and the Medical Research Council, as part of UK Research and Innovation, have up to £17 million to invest in collaborative consortia developing integrated diagnostics. Cancer Research UK has a further £3 million to invest in cancer-related projects.

Competition aims to build on recent investments

This competition is looking for projects that build on recent investments in new healthcare technologies. They should deliver new diagnostic systems by integrating across technologies, data, care pathways and systems.

Disease areas could include cancer, cardiovascular disease and stroke, inflammatory disorders including autoimmune disease, metabolic diseases, neurogenerative diseases including dementia, and paediatric and maternal-foetal.

Themes could include:

• building on strengths in digital imaging or pathology, genomics and other technologies
• improving data integration, analysis, interpretation and visualisation for early diagnosis and precision medicine
• accelerating industry research and development in integrated diagnostics
• designing and evaluating solutions in context
• building and growing lasting collaborations across business, NHS and academic researchers for UK benefit
• addressing the specific challenges of co-morbidities
• supporting industry and the NHS in developing and planning for future, comprehensive diagnosis systems and pathways
• delivering significant healthcare impact and/or economic impact
• considering the opinions of the patient and public

Competition information

• the competition is open, and the deadline for applications is at midday on 23 September 2019
• businesses of any size may apply, and consortia must include at least 1 NHS or academic partner and 1 SME
• we expect projects to range in size up to £10 million