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PolyU stands together with the Hong Kong community in collaborative efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic

PolyU stands together with the Hong Kong community in collaborative efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic

Hong Kong is battling an unprecedented wave of the novel coronavirus epidemic. The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) is committed to supporting the Government’s efforts on various fronts in the fight against the pandemic. Over 700 PolyU students, alumni and staff have signed up to support community vaccination and testing programmes and provide assistance to different groups in need. They are part of PolyU’s collaborative efforts with the community in support of the Government’s anti-pandemic measures. Supporting elderly care homes and senior citizens has become paramount given the Omicron variant’s threat in the fifth wave outbreak. PolyU’s School of Nursing is teaming up with a number of local and Mainland China donors to provide more than 200 nursing homes with supplies, including 44,000 rapid antigen test kits, 200,000 sets of personal protective equipment (including face shields and N95 respirators), and 100 pulse oximeters. These enthusiastic donors and partners include the Zhongnanshan Medical Foundation of Guangdong Province, Guangdong Hecin Scientific, Teochew International Federation and the Federation of Hong Kong Chiu Chow Community Organizations, Peking University Alumni Association Shenzhen Branch, Koch Biotechnology (Beijing), Guangdong Biolight Meditech, and Wuhan Tianhe Ruiyuan Technology. The distribution of the supplies has been rolled out in phases to address the needs of the elderly and nursing home staff and help safeguard their health. Professor David SHUM, Chair Professor of Neuropsychology and Dean of the Faculty of Health and Social Sciences, said, “PolyU has been closely working together with the Hong Kong community in the fight against COVID-19. For the past two years of the pandemic, we have been relentlessly supporting the authorities in their contact tracing efforts, and applying our research and innovation capabilities to support frontline healthcare workers and the general public. PolyU will continue to draw on its expertise from various fields and make new contributions to the Government’s anti-pandemic efforts.”  

Biggest-ever funding in the School of Nursing kicks off community participatory research to reduce COVID-19

The School of Nursing alongside the Department of Rehabilitation Sciences in PolyU have secured a total of HK$ 55.88 million from the Health and Medical Research Fund (HMRF) of the Food and Health Bureau, HK Government. This is the second* COVID-19 related HMRF fund that we have received and the biggest research support the School has ever obtained.   The study entitled ‘A Community-Based Participatory Research Approach to Reduce the Covid-19 Risk in Hong Kong: Developing and Testing Social and Behavioural Interventions’ is led by Prof. Alex Molasiotis**[Angel S.P. Chan Lau Professor in Health and Longevity] , Chair Professor of Nursing and Head of the School of Nursing. The study is among the 18 research proposals approved for funding by HMRF recently. This 4-year programme of research is funded with over HK$ 27.6 million.    The research study consists of five individual but inter-related projects targeting different groups in the society, such as ethnic minorities, caregivers of persons with chronic illness, students and the general workforce, with a common theme: Applying digital technology to enhance COVID-19 related health literacy, adherence to hygiene practices and infection control policies, as well as vaccination and early testing rates. Two eye-catching digital innovations in this programme of research are the AI-driven Vaccine Communicator and Virtual Reality Game-based Educational Intervention. The former is a web-based psycho-educational programme that incorporates the AI-driven Digital Assistant, which engages users in interactive communications and motivational interviewing skills, as well as providing relevant and effective information in addressing their hesitancy towards vaccines. The latter applies virtual reality technology to help school children learn about the routes of infection of COVID-19 and its reproduction in the host. It aims to improve hand-hygiene compliance, respiratory etiquette, and knowledge of early testing among primary school students.   Another uniqueness of this programme of research lies on its community-based participatory approach. The planning and development of health educational programmes is usually professionally-oriented with limited inputs from recipients. The research team, however, attempts to break away from the traditional top-down approach and will adopt a community-based participatory bottom-up approach to engage the health education recipients in idea exchange, discussions, and creating and evaluating the educational materials to ensure that the interventions are appropriate and culturally specific to them. ‘We are going to listen to the stakeholders and integrate their views into the development of the interventions to address their needs and specific conditions,’ said Prof. Alex Molasiotis, ‘This engagement will also enhance the community capacity to respond to future health challenges and achieve more sustainable and impactful results.’ *Prof. Angela Leung’s (Principal Investigator) ‘Blended Gaming COVID-19 Training System’ (prototype) was one of the COVID-19 commissioned research projects selected by the Food and Health Bureau last year and her team was given over HK$1.2 million from the HMRF for developing and implementing the system.   **Prof. Alex Molasiotis (Principal Applicant), Prof. Angela Leung, Co-Principal Investigators (Co-PI); Dr Grace Xie (Co-PI), Dr Grace Ho (Co-PI), Dr Yan Li (Co-PI), PolyU’s School of Nursing; Dr Polly Leung (Co-PI) [PolyU’s Department of Health Technology and Informatics]; Dr Jenny Hua Li Wang, Family Medicine and Primary Healthcare (FMPH), Hospital Authority (HA); Dr Catherine Xiao Rui Chen, FMPH, HA; and Dr Danny Wah Kun Tong, Senior Manager (Nursing)/Principal Nursing Officer, HA.

VR training system for older adults with cognitive frailty

Cognitive frailty is characterised by the presence of both physical frailty and cognitive impairment, which is a common clinical syndrome among community-dwelling older people. To help those older adults maintain their cognitive functions and simultaneously improve their motor abilities for carrying out activities of daily living, Dr Rick Kwan (principal Investigator) and his team* collaborated with Pok Oi Hospital to develop the Virtual Reality (VR) Motor-Cognitive Game-based Training System and a study was carried out to evaluate its effectiveness. The VR system was funded by the Innovation and Technology Fund for Better Living, the Innovation and Technology Bureau with HK$ 2.9 million. The system provides virtual space mimicking real environments, such as simulated road conditions in Hong Kong. When users put on the wireless VR headset, they are taken on a journey to complete tasks of activities of daily living. Following the on-screen instructions and by riding on the ergometer exercise bike, players ‘walk’ around streets to reach a shop or a supermarket to buy daily commodity by themselves, or ‘walk’ to a bus stop and travel to different destinations. The VR training system provides 16 levels of tasks with increasing difficulties to enhance the cognitive functions of players. The resistance level of the ergometer exercise bike can also be adjusted corresponding to the training need. Players have to attend two (30-minute each) VR sessions per week for a total of eight-week for achieving health benefits. Seventeen older adults with cognitive frailty from one elderly centre under Pok Oi Hospital were recruited to participate in the pilot study. Those in the intervention group receiving the VR training showed a significant improvement in cognitive function, including calculation, memory, reaction and attention, than their controlled counterparts, who received motor and cognitive training separately (each session included a 15-minute cycling and 15-minute cognitive tablet games or newspaper reading). ‘The players can apply the skills they have learnt in the VR game to their daily lives,’ said Dr Kwan. The research team aims at applying the VR system to a total of 648 elderly by the end of next year (2022). They also hope to develop a multiplayer mode that includes more tasks such as babysitting their grandchildren. Click here to see the demonstration of our VR motor-cognitive training system. *Co-investigators include Prof. Kenneth Fong, Professor, PolyU’s Department of Rehabilitation Sciences; Dr Justina Liu, Dr Harry Qin, Associate Professors, and Dr Claudia Lai, Honorary Professor; Ms Lydia Suen and Ms Man-kei Tse, Research Associates, School of Nursing, PolyU. 

New AI system provides a convenient way to detect dementia risk

Dr Thomas Choi, Professor, (Principle Investigator) and his team* announced to the public the development of an artificial intelligence (AI) system that automates the assessment of the risk of dementia with an average precision of up to 88% at a press conference held in May. Prof Choi and Dr Xiao Shen, (Postdoctoral Fellow, left the School in 2021) a key developer of the AI algorithm, have applied a patent for the system in the United States. Currently about 35% of dementia cases are attributed to risk factors, such as hypertension, obesity, depression, and smoking. Dementia risk is also associated with many non-cognitive conditions, such as cardiovascular conditions, nutrition, mobility, and depression. Early detection of people with high risk of dementia enables early modification of lifestyle, timely diagnosis and intervention. Health care professionals around the globe commonly use the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), a cognitive screening tool to identify people with cognitive impairment, however, it has some limitations. Using the MMSE at the asymptomatic stage of dementia or repeated use of the questionnaire may lead to a “practice effect” that degrades its effectiveness. Supported by HK$ 3.2 million from the Innovation and Technology Fund, Innovation and Technology Commission (ITC) of the HK Government, the research team has developed an AI assessment system that uses health data of older adults, which are routinely and vastly obtained from elderly care facilities or community centers to detect dementia risk. From 2008 to 2018, the team collected basic profile and health data (including age, gender, blood pressure, teeth condition and nutritional assessment) from over 2,000 older adults, who were aged 77 on average for the AI assessment. The average precision of AI screening of dementia reached 88%. This reliable tool makes early detection of cognitive impairment and prediction of high-risk dementia cases at the asymptomatic stage possible. It also facilitates follow-up or a detailed diagnosis by healthcare professionals. Dr Rick Kwan, said, ‘We used the existing data for predicting the risk of dementia, which was probably a new approach. After seeking their clients’ consent, staff of the participating community centres for older adults can upload the health data of their clients (the research participants) to the system to get the assessment results.’ According to Prof. Choi, the research team is planning to apply the Public Sector Trial Scheme under the ITC and use the funding for developing the AI system for implementing in local elderly service centres as well as conducting more trials to further test its effectiveness. *Team members: Dr Rick Kwan, PolyU’s School of Nursing; Dr Xiao Shen, Associate Professor of the School of Computer Science and Technology at Hainan University, Mainland China (She obtained a PhD degree at PolyU’s Department of Computing in 2019); Dr Guanjin Wang, Lecturer in information technology, Murdoch University, Western Australia, Australia (She obtained a joint PhD degree from PolyU and University of Technology Sydney in 2018. Dr Thomas Choi was her chief supervisor during her PhD study).

VR games to enhance students’ understanding and empathy towards the needs of older people with cognitive problems

The School’s Gerontological Nursing Laboratory offers a new way for students of health care disciplines to experience physical and cognitive challenges associated with ageing. Two virtual reality (VR) games were developed by Dr Justina Liu, Associate Professor (& Principal Investigator of the project) and her team** to deliver experiences of ‘losing spatial reference and wandering in streets and visual hallucinations, which are disorders experienced by older adults with cognitive problems. Funded by the Larger-scale Collaborative Project, Learning and Teaching Committee, PolyU and the School (Matching Fund), this VR games allow students to visualise abstract concepts, such as Delirium, a common syndrome affecting many elderly patients in geriatric wards and the community. When students put on the wireless VR headset, they are taken on a journey to a hospital ward to experience cognition changes that lead to hallucinations, which involve distorted visual images and perception. The game gives vivid but creepy images that allow students to immerse in an experience of sensory misperception to understand what it is like to have a delirium. Another game ‘Get lost’ sets in a local community in Hong Kong. Users are required to find the way to a supermarket. While ‘walking’ around the streets, users find themselves unable to identify directions and may get lost in a familiar surroundings. ‘These VR games play a unique role in addressing challenges associated with ageing and they are useful tools for experiential learning. Through the “hands-on” experiences, we expect that students will increase their understanding and develop empathy towards older people, which is essential for quality elderly care,’ said Dr Justina Liu. Students are also expected to apply their knowledge gained through the VR training to propose solutions or care plans targeted older people with cognitive impairment and disabilities. **Dr Rick Kwan, Dr Patrick Kor, Dr Daphne Cheung, Dr Mimi Tse, Dr Xue Bai (Associate Professor, PolyU’s Department of Applied Social Sciences), Prof. Kenneth Fong (Professor, PolyU’s Department of Rehabilitation Sciences), and Dr Tulio Pereira dos Santos Maximo (Assistant Professor, PolyU’s School of Design).

Virtual Hospital

Dr Kitty Chan, Senior Teaching Fellow of the School of Nursing (& Principal Investigator of the project) and her team* has developed the Virtual Hospital that use virtual reality technology to offer an innovative experiential learning solution to nursing students, amid suspension of face-to-face teaching and clinical placements in hospitals and clinics. Under the COVID-19 situation, the Nursing Council of Hong Kong has allowed a certain percentage of simulated learning to substitute clinical practice experience. The Virtual Hospital is an alternative means that helps students develop competence to bridge their learning gap in practicum. Set in a general ward of a hospital, the system randomly generates simulated scenarios that focus on three themes: patient safety, priority of care, handling of unexpected incidents/multiple events. Players are expected to identify settings in the ‘hospital’ that may cause safety problems, complete nursing tasks within a limited time or prioritise tasks. Players’ ability to prevent errors while handling unexpected incidents/multiple events is also tested through the VR games. A special feature of the Virtual Hospital is its flexibility to be used together with a plasma TV and tablets, which allows players’ responses and decisions to be shown in the plasma TV for whole group participation. Players’ communication with the virtual patients is recorded for review. With the tablets, other students are not passive observers, and they can engage in the scenarios and respond to the situations by answering the multiple choice questions together with the players. Another uniqueness lies in its strength to generate multiple medical events that cause distractions to players. ‘The Virtual Hospital provides students collaborative case-based problem-solving opportunities. They will engage in medical events that distract them from care delivery. Through the VR experiential learning, debriefing and group discussion, students share different ideas or solutions and learn how to act appropriately while being distracted, communicate effectively, and make clinical decisions,’ said Dr Kitty Chan. Dr Kitty Chan expected that the Virtual Hospital supplements our current practice on patient simulators or simulated patients and helps students enhance their ability to apply knowledge, improve clinical reasoning, therapeutic communications skills, critical thinking skills, and reduce errors in actual clinical situations. The game data and the automated assessment function of the system also provide conveniences to teachers in tracking students’ progress and evaluating learning outcomes. The School has developed eight Virtual Hospital systems and they will be used in the Nursing Therapeutics subjects starting from next semester (September 2021) . *Team members: Dr Rick Kwan (Co-Principal Investigator), Dr Kin Cheung, Dr Justina Liu, Mr Timothy Lai. The Virtual Hospital is funded by the PolyU Large Equipment Fund.

SN researchers among world’s top 2% of scientists on Stanford University list

Prof. Alex Molasiotis, Head of the School, and Prof. Frances Wong, Professor and Associate Dean (PolyU’s Faculty of Health and Social Sciences), have been listed among the world’s most cited researchers and those who are among the top 2% scientists within their specialty areas, released by Stanford University. A total of 163 PolyU scholars where five of them are SN scholars (including those who had left the School and retired) were named in the ranking of 2% of the best scientists whose publications are most frequently cited by other authors across the globe. PolyU has the second highest number of scientists included on the list among Hong Kong universities. The ranking method is based on standardized citation metrics developed by a group of scientists led by John PA Ioannidis##, a statistician at Stanford University. The scientists were grouped into 22 subject fields and 176 sub-fields using the indicators, which included information on citations, an individual’s scientific research output, co-authorship and a composite indicator for career-long citation impact up to the end of 2019. SN Researcher in the list Subject Field Rank in Field Field Size Prof. Alex Molasiotis Oncology & Carcinogenesis 1,197 230,678 Prof. Frances Wong Nursing 485 35,893 Dr Lorna Suen* Complementary & Alternative Medicine 145 9,518 Dr Paul Lee** General & Internal Medicine 933 106,795 Dr Esther Mok# Nursing 644 35,893 *Associate Professor before she left the School in 2021. ** Assistant Professor before he left the School in 2021. # Professor and Associate Head (Postgraduate Education) of the School before her retirement in 2014. ## The study was published in the journal Public Library of Science Biology, click here to view.

PolyU School of Nursing launches Youth Quitline run by nursing students

The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) announced the launch of student-run “Youth Quitline” service from the School of Nursing (SN), and a kick-off ceremony was held recently. The service provides free telephone counselling for young people who want to quit smoking, while nursing students are also given clinical placement opportunities to serve the youth under the pandemic, where they can learn to work in a community setting to benefit people in need. The "Youth Quitline" is funded by the Tobacco and Alcohol Control Office of the Department of Health. Trained nursing students from PolyU are responsible for providing essential information to young people aged 25 or below, educating them about the health hazards and misconceptions associated with smoking (including emerging tobacco products), as well as offering assessments of nicotine dependence, formulating smoking cessation plans, suggesting various methods to control smoking addiction and providing free auricular cessation services, so as to help young people develop good lifestyle habits. Referrals can also be made for other appropriate smoking cessation services when needed. “Currently, training on smoking cessation counselling is not covered in most undergraduate nursing curricula. In view of this, PolyU's School of Nursing decided to train students in smoking cessation counselling skills and help them put their learning into practice. They will thus not only be equipped with professional knowledge, but also with essential hands-on experience,” said Professor David Shum, Yeung Tsang Wing Yee and Tsang Wing Hing Professor in Neuropsychology, Chair Professor of Neuropsychology and Dean of the Faculty of Health and Social Sciences of PolyU. He added that due to the pandemic situation, many clinical placements originally planned at various hospitals have been suspended. With the launch of the “Youth Quitline”, the School of Nursing will provide training to its Year 3 students to serve as peer counsellors, preparing them to offer smoking cessation counselling and health education to the public in their future capacity as professional nurses. The “Youth Quitline” has successfully served over 70 young smokers since its launch. Professor Alex Molasiotis, Angel S.P. Chan Lau Professor in Health and Longevity, Chair Professor of Nursing and Head of the School of Nursing, said, “By February next year, PolyU's School of Nursing is expected to have trained nearly 300 nursing students who are able to provide smoking cessation counselling. This will ensure sufficient manpower in expanding clinical and community-based services to quit smoking and hence better promote the benefits of quitting smoking to the general public.” To learn more about the “Youth Quitline” operated by PolyU, please visit: https://www.polyuyql.com/

The 9th Cross-Border Elderly Care Seminar - Opportunities and Challenges of Ageing in Greater Bay Area: Cross-border Services Amid of Covid-19

The 9th Cross-Border Elderly Care Seminar, themed “Opportunities and Challenges of Ageing in Greater Bay Area: Cross-border Services Amid of Covid-19” was held online on 22 January 2021. The seminar, jointly organised by eight local research institutes/societies and associations, attracted 270 participants to attend, including elderly care professionals and people who are interested in cross-border elderly care. Organisers of the seminar included: the Centre for Gerontological Nursing, School of Nursing, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU); PolyU’s Department of Applied Social Sciences and Institute of Active Ageing ; Sau Po Centre on Ageing, The University of Hong Kong (HKU); Asia-Pacific Institute of Ageing Studies, Lingnan University; Hong Kong Association of Gerontology; Helping Hand;, and Hong Kong Society for Rehabilitation. This seminar gave an opportunity for participants to learn more about elderly care services across the border. It also aimed to urge the Hong Kong government and the elderly care sector to support cross-border elderly care so that older adults in Hong Kong can plan ahead to age in the Greater Bay area (GBA). Prof. Wen Zhuoyi Vincent, Research Assistant Professor, Asia-Pacific Institute of Ageing Studies, Lingnan University, moderated the seminar. Dr Justina Liu, Associate Professor and Deputy Director of the Centre for Gerontological Nursing, School of Nursing, PolyU, said in her welcoming speech that the provision of medical services and social resources in the GBA are the key elements in promoting cross-border ageing. Mr Yuen Man Chung, Commissioner for the Development of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, delivered a keynote speech to review the government’s measures in promoting Hong Kong older adults ageing in the GBA and overview policies announced by the central government and the ministries and commissions of Guangdong Province on living or ageing in the GBA. Prof. Chung-Mau Lo, Hospital Chief Executive, University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital [also Chin Lan Hong Professor and Chair of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery; Chief of Division of Liver Transplantation, HKU/Queen Mary Hospital], talked about the development of the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital in the past nine years and how to innovate cross-border medical service and promote the integration of medical services in the GBA. Mr Jacob Wong, Councilor of Life Insurance Council and Member of Task Force on Greater China Affairs, The Hong Kong Federation of Insurers, outlined the needs and considerations of retirees, and introduced the retirement protection in Hong Kong as well as the retirement protection and medical insurance plans in the in the GBA. Dr Lou Wei Qun, Vivian, the Director of Sau Po Centre on Ageing, HKU, moderated the panel discussion. Dr Leung Pui-Yu Pamela, Chief Executive Officer of the Hong Kong Society for Rehabilitation, talked about the challenges in operating the Hong Kong Jockey Club Yee Hong Height, a rehabilitation and elderly care centre in Shenzhen during the COVID-19 pandemic, such as limitations on transporting medical supplies and the telemedicine system, border restrictions hindering residents returning to Hong Kong to attend medical consultations. She also talked about the supportive measures from the Hong Kong and Shenzhen governments during the pandemic. Mr Colman Wong, Chief Executive Officer, Helping Hand, shared how their elderly home in Zhaoqing operated during the pandemic and talked about their administrative arrangements, infection control measures, and entertainment and recreational activities for their residents. Ms. Zhou Xiao-yan, President, Guangdong Professional Social Workers Association, spoked about the practice of social work for older adults in the GBA and introduced the institutional elderly care service and ageing in place in Guangdong Province. Dr Leung Man Fuk Edward, President, Hong Kong Association of Gerontology, gave a closing remarks to conclude the seminar.