Main Business Activity - Medical equipment training and web-based learning provider

Project Outline - Decentralised health service buying approach provided opportunity for selling e-commerce packages to individual hospitals

XOR Ltd is a consultancy specialising in e-learning. They spotted that the trend away from centralised buying in the health service industry, offered an opportunity for selling e-learning packages to individual hospitals or even wards.

XOR Ltd has been helping clients develop their e-learning skills and training programes since 1991. The company is based at the Knowledge Dock in East London and operates through a network of specialists with expertise in different sectors. It has worked with government departments like the UK department for work and pensions as well as major retailers like Argos and Tesco, helping operations staff to create new material to keep up with trends in the retail sector.

John O’Sullivan, founder of XOR Ltd, recognised that the growth of the company was limited by the time-based fee charging structure, which is typical of the consultancy business. He was looking for a way to move from bespoke projects to product sales. XOR had already worked with clients in the health services and John saw the fragmentation of purchasing in the sector as a distinct opportunity. “A lot of them have gone their own way – each region works autonomously”, says John. However, John recognised that they would have to overcome their ‘chicken and egg’ problem of having to create a product to sell. “It’s a difficult market to penetrate. We thought the only way was to create a product and get it out there”.

The product they developed was a training package for an infusion pump, the device that nursing staff use to administer fluids to a patient intravenously. According to John there are often several different models of the pump on a ward at one time. “Some of the pumps are just sitting there. Suppliers sell them to the health service but only around 5% of nurses know how to use them”. John believes that this often has quite serious consequences. He points to statistics from the National Patient Agency, which reports over 700 unsafe incidents per year related to intravenous devices.  XOR realised that they were perfectly placed to work with nursing specialists to develop training packages for the most widely used brands of equipment.

XOR looked to the knowledgebase collaboration project for help in creating an interactive e-learning course and web-based learning environment. The programme allowed XOR to work with Maggie Nicol at St Bartholomew’s School for Nursing and Midwifery. Maggie applied her expertise in medical devices to asses training needs and to help XOR structure a learning programme for nursing staff.

The project helped demonstrate that the e-learning package approach can help healthcare staff develop a high level of skill and understanding before they use an infusion device with a real patient. XOR have recently added an e-commerce engine to their web site, with the intention to sign up manufacturers who want to come on a site that will increasingly act as a portal for health service e-learning. According to John the challenge now is to scale up the business. He believes the e-learning approach suits all health care professionals around the world. XOR have recently been asked to carry out a trial for the Liverpool NHS Trust and they are also planning to develop training packages for other models of pump and other medical devices in the near future. “If we owned the whole market for the Graseby pump and everyone brought it, it would be worth around £10m a year”. Concludes John.