Blog posts

Turning lived experience into innovation: How Tamara Tortosa is building Qalyup

After taking part in WE Innovate at Imperial, Tamara Tortosa reflects on how her personal experience of seeking treatment abroad led to the creation of Qalyup – a startup focused on improving access to safer healthcare.

Tamara Tortosa is a nurse and alumna of the Institute of Global Health Innovation‘s MSc in Health Policy at Imperial College London. Her journey into entrepreneurship has been shaped by the intersection of lived experience, healthcare and academia. It was further shaped through her participation in WE Innovate, a pre-accelerator programme for women in innovation at the Imperial Enterprise Lab.

In her own words, Tamara reflects on the experience that led her to launch Qalyup.

Understanding antimicrobial resistance: from measurement to better decision-making

A resident doctor reviews a patient late in the day. The presence of an infection is uncertain. The guidelines are long and complex, and time is limited. The consultant wants a decision. The patient is expecting treatment.

Does the doctor prescribe antibiotics or not?

This is the reality of antimicrobial prescribing in hospitals. Decisions are often made under pressure, shaped not only by clinical evidence but by time constraints, hierarchy and patient expectations. These decisions matter. Every unnecessary or inappropriate prescription contributes, in small but cumulative ways, to a much larger global challenge: antimicrobial resistance (AMR).

AMR occurs when microbes such as bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites no longer respond to the drugs used to treat them.

IGHI at Digital Health Rewired 2026: Shaping the future of digital health

The Institute of Global Health Innovation (IGHI) at Imperial College London will showcase its work in digital health, leadership and policy at Digital Health Rewired 2026. The event brings together digital health leaders, innovators and policymakers from across the UK.

Taking place on 24–25 March at the NEC Birmingham, Rewired will bring together experts from across healthcare, technology and research to explore how digital innovation is transforming health systems. Across the two-day programme, IGHI researchers, educators and partners will take part in keynote conversations and panel discussions exploring how data, artificial intelligence and research-led leadership are shaping the future of healthcare.

Empowering Youth Voices in Climate Change Education: What I’ve Learnt as the Compass Project Youth Advisor

Simrika Amatya is a Youth Advisor to the Compass Project, an initiative led by the Climate Cares Centre exploring how education can best empower young people to live, work, and thrive in a changing climate. Throughout 2025, the Compass Project conducted group discussions, co-design workshops, and a survey with students and educators – facilitated by and designed together with the project’s Youth and Educator Advisors. In this blog, Simrika reflects on her experience with the Compass Project.

“From the first session, you feel like you made the right decision”: The importance of wellbeing in digital teaching

This blog was written by IGHI Teaching Fellow, Julien le Jeune d’Allegeershecque. It features reflections on wellbeing, belonging and flexibility in online learning from Julien and Dunya Al‑Hayali, a MSc Health Policy student. 

More and more students are opting for online postgraduate taught (PGT) programmes. It allows people from diverse cultural, linguistic and professional backgrounds to balance study with work and caring commitments. Although flexible and convenient, the online environment doesn’t have in-person contact and it can present unfamiliar institutional norms. This can affect students’ confidence, engagement and academic outcomes.

In a recent presentation for Imperial’s Students’ Voice initiative, chaired by Monica Tolocica from the Imperial Institute of Lifelong Learning, Dunya and I explored the challenges of online education.

Leadership, Learning and Digital Innovation: Meet the New Digital Health Leadership Programme Cohort

Earlier this month, more than 60 students from the latest cohort of the Digital Health Leadership Programme (DHLP) came together in York to mark the beginning of their learning journey.

Over two days, students had the opportunity to connect with their peers, meet the academic team, and gain an understanding of what to expect from the year ahead. The forum included sessions from experts on leadership styles and reflective learning, the CliftonStrengths assessment, and time working within newly formed peer support groups. A highlight of the event was an immersive induction game, where students worked in teams to solve a series of puzzles as part of a simulated crisis in the NHS referral system.

Rising Faster Than the Sea Levels: Building Youth Resilience in the Philippines

In the Philippines, where typhoons and extreme heat are intensifying, young people are not only witnessing the climate crisis, but they are also living it. The research project Rising Faster Than the Sea Levels is working to understand and support the mental health and wellbeing of Filipino youth as they navigate the climate crisis. 

  

 

The study is an example of co-developed research done with researchers including Dr John Aruta from De La Salle University, researchers at the Climate Cares Centre and codesigned by the Young Person Advisory Group (YPAG). Sophia Pahulayan, a recent graduate of Dr Aruta’s, is a project facilitator who helped to manage the project and cofacilitate the group discussions alongside young people, a vital linking point between the young cohort and the researchers.

Co-designing for change: Imperial and Jason Roberts Foundation Partner to Tackle Prostate Cancer Inequalities through the ‘messenger effect’

In partnership with the Jason Roberts Foundation, our team at Change Lab has been exploring how to better support Black men, when it comes to understanding prostate cancer and encouraging participation in early detection initiatives. This project was generously funded by the Bob Willis Fund and its work forms part of the LIMIT study which is contributing to wider efforts to make diagnostic research more accessible, inclusive, and responsive to the needs of communities often underrepresented in uptake of cancer testing.

The LIMIT Study tests a new MRI scan that can take place in the community and allows for prostate cancer to be detected in just 5-minutes.

Designing healthcare for people and planet

This blog was co-authored by Helix Centre designers Sophie Horrocks and Tori Simpson.  

What if every act of care also cared for the planet?

From care pathways to medical products, healthcare can (and must) be designed to minimise waste, reduce emissions, and protect planetary health. This is not a distant vision, but an urgent necessity. As the world’s leading designers gather for the World Design Congress themed Design for Planet, here at the Helix Centre, we are exploring what it will take to make this ambition a reality, and the role human-centred design in healthcare can play in achieving it.