Sensyne Health and The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust sign Strategic Research Agreement

Sensyne Health and The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust sign Strategic Research Agreement

• New agreement enables the ethical application of clinical artificial intelligence research on anonymised patient data to improve patient care and accelerate research into new medicines
• The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust receives equity stake in Sensyne Health plc and will receive IT research funding and a share of revenues

Oxford, U.K. 20 January 2021: Sensyne Health plc (LSE: SENS) (“Sensyne” or the “Company” or the “Group”), the UK Clinical AI company, today announces that it has signed a five year non-exclusive Strategic Research Agreement (SRA) with The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust (“RWT” or “The Trust”). The agreement will enable the ethical application of clinical AI research to improve patient care and accelerate research into new medicines.

The RWT dataset covers 700,000 unique patient records from a patient population of approximately 470,000 people. The new SRA  brings the combined total of anonymised data available for analysis by Sensyne to 6.8 million patients.

RWT is one of the largest providers of healthcare in the West Midlands employing more than 10,500 staff covering acute, community and primary care services.  The Trust’s services cover the population of Wolverhampton, the wider Black Country, South Staffordshire, North Worcestershire and Shropshire. RWT acts as a specialist centre for a number of different services including cancer, stroke and heart and lung services.

Research will be undertaken to the highest standards of information governance and data security in accordance with NHS principles, the UK Government Code of Practice and data protection legislation. All data supplied to Sensyne will be anonymised by RWT beforehand and the provision of the data will operate under an agreed Data Processing Protocol (“DPP”) under RWT ethical oversight. 

The Trust will receive 1,428,571 ordinary shares in Sensyne Health plc representing 0.9% of the existing issued share capital of Sensyne. This brings the total share ownership held by NHS Trusts in Sensyne to 12.6% (as enlarged by the expected issue of shares to RWT, Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Somerset NHS Foundation Trust, Milton Keynes University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, George Eliot Hospital NHS Trust and Wye Valley NHS Trust - the SRAs with George Eliot & Wye Valley remain subject to NHSEngland approval prior to final closing and issue of shares in Sensyne).

RWT will also receive from Sensyne an investment of up to £250,000 per year over the 5-year term of the contract for specific investments in NHS information technology to enable the curation and analysis of data under the SRA. The Trust will receive a royalty on revenues that are generated by Sensyne from the research undertaken under the SRA. The financial return RWT receives from Sensyne will be reinvested back into the NHS to fund patient care. The Trust has entered into a lock-up agreement whereby it has agreed not to dispose of any shares for a period of two years from the date the shares are issued.

RWT joins the 9 existing NHS Trusts that Sensyne has SRAs (8 Trusts) and data access agreements (1 Trust) with.

Sultan Mahmud, Chief Innovation, Integration and Research Officer at The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust, said:

We are delighted to announce a partnership with Sensyne  Health. Their  model of collaboration with the NHS and active investment into the NHS is a unique one. Sensyne are currently working with several leading NHS Foundation Trusts and joining this community of practice enhances our ability to test new and innovative ways to use data to drive care processes and contribute to  vital health research. In this collaboration we will focus on improving prevention, early diagnosis and treatment of illnesses for complex  patients  so that we can provide anticipatory care. Our clinical teams and informatics colleagues are looking forwarding to working with Sensyne.

Lord (Paul) Drayson PhD, CEO of Sensyne Health, said:

“I would like to welcome The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust as a new SRA partner and look forward to working with them.  The SRA continues Sensyne’s momentum in expanding its anonymised patient data set and deepening the diversity of the therapeutic areas within it.  This in turn helps provide Sensyne with the critical mass of data to improve patient care and accelerate medical research”. 

The issue of new ordinary shares in Sensyne Health to the Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust remains subject to receipt of a s593 report by the Company and a further announcement will be made in due course once the shares have been issued and allotted.