Carbon Monoxide (CO) poisoning is a big issue in the UK. It’s estimated 4,000 A&E attendances, 200 hospital admissions and around 20 deaths each year in England come as a result of the silent and deadly gas.
However, there’s a data gap in the reporting of CO poisoning cases that creates significant challenges for organisations/businesses, like Cadent, that seek to combat the issue. And worryingly, we’ve discovered, in fact, that cases of CO poisoning may be much higher than expected because of this – at least 7x higher according to our latest data.
We believe data is critical to understanding the issue of CO poisoning, its scale, and configuring the most effective solutions to address it. We therefore knew that work needed to be done to address this data gap. So, this year, Cadent has created the CO Research and Analytics (CORA) platform, a cloud-based system which aggregates sets of data on CO poisoning and analyses them for trends and new insights. Alongside this, we’ve helped to set up the Carbon Monoxide Partner Ecosystem (COPE) – a partnership of various stakeholders from health trusts to academia and emergency services that frequently deal with CO poisoning cases. The aim is for us to work together to align approaches that can help to prevent further hospitalisations and deaths. We hope that as time goes on and more organisations contribute data for the platform, we’ll gain insights that can change how CO poisoning is tackled in this country and ultimately save lives.
The issue at large
Carbon Monoxide is a silent, odourless gas. It can be leaked into homes as a result of faulty or poorly maintained gas appliances, but infrastructure issues such as poor ventilation or blocked chimneys, are known to also create leaks. The gas’s properties naturally make it hard to detect and even emergency responders can’t always tell what’s happened. For example, once you open a window, the CO that caused the symptoms might be gone by the time help arrives, leaving no evidence of CO in the building.
Symptoms can range from dizziness, headaches and nausea, but in more severe cases, it can lead to fatalities. The problem is that these symptoms are not unique to CO poisoning and as awareness tends to be low, people experiencing these symptoms often dismiss it as something else, not realising they’re actively being exposed.
At the moment, the best frontline defence is having a CO detector, which will ring when it detects a gas leak in the property it’s placed in. However, according to recent research, almost half (42%) of homes in the country do not have a carbon monoxide (CO) alarm. Even in homes with a CO detector, many residents are unfamiliar with the alarm’s sound, forget to replace the battery, or rarely test it. These are just a few of the issues that create challenges for first responders and others involved in tracking CO poisoning cases. First, they make households more susceptible to CO poisoning. Additionally, it becomes increasingly difficult to gather evidence of CO presence in a property without the essential first-line defence of a working CO detector.
Once a gas leak or CO poisoning case is reported, several stakeholders are involved in protecting the individual(s) and property affected. We work with engineers and First Line Operatives who will go to the property to investigate the leak’s cause and ensure it’s fixed, whilst emergency responders and healthcare staff will treat symptoms of CO poisoning. The problem is that these organisations all work in silos. There’s no exchange of data to check for trends or corroborate for accuracy, for example. They also all have their own approaches and metrics regarding what they look for with CO leaks or poisoning cases. This leads to data gaps and currently means that the broader picture and important trends we could be spotting to prevent CO poisoning fatalities are being missed.
Utilising tech as a solution
The CO Research and Analytics (CORA) platform is a cloud-based platform that brings together incident data from different CO stakeholders.
Our data engineers have constructed the database and designed it so that the legacy of siloed and diverse datasets is now centralised in one modern and unified platform. By making critical information across different stakeholders easy to understand and easily shareable, we have ensured that everyone involved stays informed in real time, which is essential for collaborative decision-making. We have been able to identify patterns and trends across different regions and by using predictive AI models we have been able to forecast high-risk areas and develop focused solutions.
Whilst the collation of this data is novel, valuable insights and trends were also uncovered by utilising advanced analytics that enabled a deep dive into the data. These insights and trends are made accessible to stakeholders by being displayed within dynamic dashboards that were created using cloud-based reporting tools.
Furthermore, cutting edge GenAI techniques were applied to perform text analysis on the hundreds of thousands of CO incident reports received, uncovering key reporting insights from previously unseen data. The application of correlation analyses allowed the identification of patterns and relationships, particularly around socio-economic factors and the risks associated with CO exposure. Using predictive AI models for forecasting has enabled the development of more effective and timely data-driven interventions to mitigate potential hazards. These might look like: providing intelligence for responders, upgrades to professional training, ensuring standardisation of data collection, highlighting innovation opportunities around manufacture and maintenance, and developing the evidence required by government departments with remits that cover CO to inform policy decisions.
Embracing a collaborative approach
We created the COPE in an effort to bridge the silos and form a collaborative effort that allows stakeholders on the frontline of gas leaks and CO poisoning to exchange knowledge and best practices. Alongside the CORA platform, we hope that this helps to address our longstanding data gap and encourages a more collaborative way of working amongst these stakeholders. No single sector holds all the answers to combating this issue – so it’s only through transparency and continuous discussions that we can create effective solutions and save lives.
A safer future
Overall, the CORA platform is showing its potential to be an important asset to public health protection and successful industry collaboration through data integration. We’re excited about the future and how we can further create opportunities to use data insights from the platform to drive safety, lower CO poisoning cases, and prevent fatalities.
We’ll continue to spearhead such solutions since we believe a myriad of innovative ideas, such as this, are needed to combat CO poisoning. Unfortunately, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. In the realm of prevention, we see this as an armour in our belt to address this issue, alongside initiatives like our Crucial Crew CO education workshops (our school outreach programme).
Does your business have any CO data it can submit for the CORA platform? If so, please contact Kate Ravenscroft at kate.ravenscroft@cadentgas.com for more information.
Phil Burrows
Phil Burrows is Head of Customer Vulnerability at Cadent.
