Lily Montague, a Creative Computing student who graduated in 2023, worked with Dr Karen Shoop in the SEMS Design Studio on their project across three years. Called The Memory Project, they worked with the Royal London Hospital’s A&E department and the London Air Ambulance to design a system integrating the wisdom gained through experiences of clinicians working in trauma, to help doctors and nurses keep improving the quality of care they deliver to patients.

Since graduating, they are continuing this project and working with Dr Samy Sadek to carry out user research, which saw them observe two shifts with the London Air Ambulance team last month. On these shifts they were reunited with their Design Engineering tutor, Dr Karen Shoop.

Lily said, “observing two London Air Ambulance shifts this week has left me feeling awestruck and humbled.

Finding ourselves in stairwells, motorways and even a cinema, the research demonstrated the breadth of scenarios the London Air Ambulance’s kit needs to be designed for. I am in awe of the commitment to patient care from all the emergency service staff I met throughout Friday and Saturday night.”

The project continues its trajectory, under the wing of Foundation 5, a company founded by Dr Sadek which brings designers and medics together to forward innovation in critical care. Lily and Dr Sadek are working towards securing funding for the project before 2026.

Lily, Karen, Ben and Samy published a paper on the project last year titled 'The Institutional Memory Project: Strengthening Institutional Memory at the Emergency Departmen…