Great curiosity about the prototype of future preventive care

- There are lots of lifestyle-related diseases and in the future it is likely that many of them can be prevented. The healthcare system is overloaded and with new technologies, including genetic tests, you can find out about your health risks before you get sick, says Pomme van Hoof, innovation leader and service designer at Södersjukhuset's innovation department.

In order to give people an experience as close to reality as possible of a possible future preventive healthcare, the Prevention clinic was set up at Södersjukhuset for a week in November 2022. The project is one of those financed within the framework of Vinnova's call for proposals for Future Prototypes. After the visitors shared their data through, among other things, a genetic test and a lifestyle scan of the mobile phone, they got to meet the Oracle, an AI that based on the data gave a personal health forecast and a prescription.

- You got to feel the experience - how does it feel to share my data? Be told my risks? It is one thing to intellectually think about the questions, another thing to experience. People didn't know if they really wanted to scan their phone to have their lifestyle analyzed. Even though the visitors knew it wasn't real, the experience was almost like it was, says Maria Stockhaus.

The prescription in the form of a pill was picked up on the spot and a twist at the end was that the acting pharmacist told us that if the pill was not taken within 24 hours it would be reported to the state.

- It led to an interesting dialogue. If hospital costs will increase, how will one need to prioritize? In a world where disease can be prevented, would it be permissible to be unhealthy? says Pomme van Hoof.

The future prototype and the methodology behind it have attracted great interest both at SÖS and among other colleagues in healthcare. One of the days, the entire exhibition was moved to a nearby health care conference with visitors who work with the development of health care, where it led to many interesting system discussions.

After the exhibition, the innovation team also got to hold a workshop about the project at the SÖS chief's day with 220 participants. They raised the questions and background research on which the project is based and led an interactive part where everyone had to think about how a prevention-based way of working would affect their own division and their patients. Since then, they have also presented the project at the Vitalis fair in Gothenburg.

With the help of further funding from Vinnova, the team has documented the project in film and pictures so that many more people can share in the experience afterwards. On the website there is a film where you can follow the experience through the entire installation and hear the participants' reflections and reactions.

- We get an incredible amount of requests, but we can't go out to everyone, but want to get others to use our material and spread it further, says Pomme van Hoof.

The project has also received a lot of attention in the design world and has received a nomination as one of three for the Svensk Forms Design S-prize in the Design for systemic transformation category.
The next step is a relaunch of the website which includes the interactive part "Join the conversation" where visitors can like and write down their reflections on the questions that were asked in the exhibition. The hope is, say Maria Stockhaus and Pomme van Hoof, that the discussions can live on and that the documentation from the project can serve as inspiration to trigger dialogue about the pros and cons of a health care system built on prevention.

- We hope that this can lead to an inspiring overview of people's thoughts and musings connected to the health care of the future, says Maria Stockhaus.

Has working with the prototype changed your basic ideas
on what this area will look like going forward?

- I have become more aware of the ethical issues, the philosophical part of the issues. What does it mean to be human? To have a healthy life? Within the project, we are constantly working with such questions, says Pomme van Hoof.

- I have become very aware when I have learned so much about the subject. I think about when I eat sugar and, for example, the strong negative connection that involuntary loneliness has to health, says Maria Stockhaus.

- After our exhibition, Chat GPT came and there is already research showing that AI services can be more empathetic than doctors, for example when they ask questions. It makes you think further, says Pomme van Hoof.

You can get more information and a film experience of the prototype on the prevention clinic's website.

Welcome to the Prevention reception!