A team of Cranfield University students have come up with a novel solution for increasing awareness of the need for preparation in the event of a flu epidemic, as part of a project for the NHS.
The project was undertaken as part of the group project element of the Master of Design (MDes) in Innovation and Creativity in Industry course. The team came up with a postable flat-pack pop up bag with a number of pockets designed for specific medical and hygiene-related items, and a related pop up book. The bag comes with an associated shopping list designed to encourage people to fill the bag themselves, and in doing so, recognise and understand the need for each element.
The group’s work has been directly informing the Department of Health Pandemic Influenza Preparedness Project based at Whitehall.
A representative said: "The social care work stream of the Department of Health Pandemic Influenza Preparedness Project is well aware of the need to communicate effectively with individuals and family groups to support the national response to a pandemic.
"Research that helps to target such communications is likely to help to enhance the planning and resilience of individuals and families. The current out break of H1N1 swine flu has, even in its early stages done much to demonstrate the need to communicate a range of changing messages over the course of an event. This work will help to inform our communications strategies, and will support this project with interest."
As a result of this project, Cranfield University, through the Centre for Competitive Creative Design (C4D), will be collaborating with the NHS on further research to consider how such a flu epidemic could be dealt with in terms of communication tools.
The project was funded through the Emergency Planning Team at the Bedfordshire Primary Care Trust.
Further information on C4D is available at www.centrefordesign.co.uk. Details on the Master of Design (MDes) Innovation and Creativity in Industry are available at www.cranfield.ac.uk/sas/mdes
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