Worcestershire showcases 5G project at national event
As part of the West Mercia Rural 5G (WMR5G) project, Worcestershire County Council and its partners have shared their 5G experiences at an exclusive UK5G Showcase Event held in Birmingham this week.
The event gave Worcestershire an opportunity to highlight the joint ambitions of innovative public and private sector partners, striving to find ways to improve connectivity and provide access to key services in rural areas.
Stephen Ashton, Senior Project Manager at Worcestershire County Council, said: "The project is leading the way on investigating how to build 5G infrastructure quickly and efficiently in rural spaces as well as the impact 5G has on rural communities, specifically to support health and social care services. The ‘Connected Worker’ project trials the use of a wearable connected camera which provides support and expert advice to care home staff, without the need to bring highly specialised GPs to the location.
"The second ‘Health XR’ project is an experimental mobile application that maps the movement of a patient following a prescribed exercise for their physiotherapist to review. This event has provided an excellent opportunity to present our front-line 5G progress and experiences, with representations from WMR5G on the panels covering 5G in Health & Social Care and 5G in Rural.’’
The 5G network went live towards the end of 2021 to support the delivery of the trials, which are due to finish this summer.
The project is funded by the Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sports (DCMS) as part of the wider DCMS’s 5G Rural Connected Communities (RCC) project. Worcestershire County Council lead a consortium of public and private sector partners, collectively known as West Mercia Rural 5G (WMR5G).
