Backed by funding from the Welsh Assembly Government, Swansea Bay and Hywel Dda University Health Boards have started a year long pilot with clinical machine learning start-up OPCI to integrate the OpenPredictor software into pre-operative assessment processes.

OpenPredictor uses a machine learning model that has been trained on anonymised patient health data to give a prediction of a patient’s likelihood of experiencing post-operative complications from elective hip and knee surgery.

If successful, OPCI hopes to roll out the software in other hospital boards and trusts as a tool to help streamline the pre-operative assessment process, increase surgical hub use, and help reduce waiting lists according to the company.

OPCI says it is hoped that the successful implementation of OpenPredictor will help hospitals to better manage waiting lists and better allocate patients to surgery locations suited to their level of risk to reduce surgery wait times and delivering more consistently high levels of care for patients.

The first phase of the pilot is due to be completed in December, at which point further claims relating to the software will be tested says OPCI.

OpenPredictor was initially developed in the NHS by Orthopaedic surgeons Justin Green and Professor Mike Reed before OPCI was launched in November 2024 to take the software public.