Tackling health inequalities: the West Yorkshire Mayor’s big ideas challenge

The West Yorkshire DPP Support and Prescribing Support Platform is a new digital platform offering the region’s pharmacists training, mentorship and peer support. This empowers pharmacists to improve patient access, deliver safer prescribing, and directly tackle local health inequalities, strengthening primary care for everyone across West Yorkshire.

Leeds-based Asclepius MedTech has developed Surgfit to help hospitals deliver safer and more effective surgical care. Built by clinicians, Surgifit uses wearable biosensors to assess patients before their surgery, in the comfort of their own home, providing a more convenient and patient friendly alternative that reduces hospital visits.

Built to challenge unrealistic beauty standards and help teens reduce comparison and build a positive relationship with their bodies. Through guided coaching sessions, psycho-education, and peer support groups, Body Image Coach helps to develop self-acceptance, confidence, and body appreciation – tackling the root cause of body image struggle that impact mental and physical health.

Created by Carly Walter Coaching and Consultancy, MAGI is an AI-powered wellbeing companion designed by, and for, neurodivergent women or any women navigating burnout, overwhelm, or hormonal shifts. From emotional regulation to daily decision support, it’s accessible, non-judgmental and personalised. 

An innovative app that supports professional women in West Yorkshire to strengthen their confidence, resilience and wellbeing during key life and career transitions. By addressing the root causes of burnout and progression barriers, it will shape healthier, more inclusive workplaces where women can thrive, lead, and drive lasting change.

The Creative Health Learning Pathway is an apprenticeship programme led by Featherstone Rovers Foundation with Spectrum People combining accredited training, mentorship, and hands-on experience to equip underserved individuals with skills to deliver arts and wellbeing activities, tackling health inequalities and building a new creative workforce across West Yorkshire.

Harmonai is an AI-powered wellbeing platform for carers, offering personalised support, guided journaling and a safe, understanding peer community. Blending self-help tools with therapeutic techniques, it empowers mental health, resilience and connection anytime, anywhere.

Created by Health Innovation Ventures, GP Pathways is an intelligent care navigating platform that empowers GP reception teams to safely signpost patients to Pharmacy First, Self Care, a more appropriate clinician or community-based health and care teams – easing GP pressure and tackling health inequalities through faster, fairer and more appropriate access to care.

A mental health recovery programme that is redefining healthcare. Through lived-experience, leadership, digital innovation, unique educational approaches, and inclusive group support, HEROES embeds a new standard of compassionate, whole-person healing into mainstream systems. It is driving a shift in how mental health is understood and worked with, and is designed to reach those often excluded from care.

Humant enables occupational therapists to conduct remote home assessments using 3D scans, images, and videos captured via smartphone. It supports clinical decision-making, reduces delays and improves patient safety by streamlining adaptive equipment planning, cutting costs and increasing capacity across NHS and social care services.

This innovation aims to harness the lived experience of disabled people and other groups that are disproportionately affected by health equalities to co-produce and co-deliver educational training and learning resources to health and social care practitioners. This will create long-term positive solutions that are needs-based, person-centred and led by those with lived experience.

Created by JGME Consulting UK, EqualCare Assess is an AI-powered platform that automates Care Act assessments. Automating this process provides faster and fairer access to adult social care. By reducing delays, overcoming language barriers, and promoting equity, it empowers vulnerable communities in West Yorkshire to receive timely support, improving health outcomes and inequalities.

Created by KayHector Consulting, DiaHype Lifestyle Solutions is an AI-powered platform helping South Asian and African Caribbean communities in West Yorkshire to prevent and manage chronic conditions such as diabetes and hypertension. The platform delivers culturally-tailored lifestyle education, self-care tools, and virtual support – boosting health literacy, reducing hospital visits, and promoting lasting, family-focused behavioural change. 

Polly, created by Key Engineering Solutions, is an AI-powered speech and language platform helping young children in disadvantaged communities develop core communication skills. Co-designed with therapists, Polly delivers personalised, playful therapy sessions in schools and homes, making early intervention for those children who require support with their communication accessible, scalable, and effective. 

This solution supports NHS speech and language therapy teams to identify the needs of children accessing their service. By improving referral and screening processes, only children with genuine clinical needs are directed into therapy pathways – helping to ease the backlog for speech and language therapy services. The SHARE platform’s Waiting-Well initiative boosts parental engagement through targeted home-based strategies for treatment response.

Luma³ Editions, created by Mind Body goals, is a digital tool that has been integrated into existing NHS patient pathways. It offers proven breathwork and mindfulness techniques, providing accessible, preventative mental wellbeing skills. This innovative solution democratises vital self-management for all socioeconomic groups, enhancing patient experience and proactive health outcomes across West Yorkshire.

Empowers neurodiverse individuals by giving them the tools to regulate their emotions and express their needs. The product improves mental health outcomes and is co-designed with educators and clinicians, and the app helps build social communication and executive functioning skills, enabling users to thrive across real-world settings.  

Loneliness can deeply affect the lives of older people and is an often overlooked health issue. Third Age Therapeutics is tackling the epidemic of loneliness by empowering people to make meaningful changes in their lives through an evidence-based telehealth solution that prevents poor mental health and loneliness in aging populations – harnessing the power of local communities, in partnership with the region’s best science.

UKind Therapy CIC delivers trauma-informed virtual reality (VR) therapy, co-designed with survivors of domestic abuse. Combining immersive VR with AI-guided support, UKind XR empowers users to heal from trauma, build confidence, and reconnect with purpose. The solution increases access to safe, self-led mental health support across diverse communities.