The National Institute for Health and Care Research has awarded £1.65 million to 17 pioneering projects aimed at accelerating the development of quantum technologies that could transform patient care across the NHS. The funding will support early-stage innovations designed to tackle some of healthcare's most complex challenges, from earlier cancer diagnosis to advanced intensive care monitoring.
The investment has been made through the NIHR's Invention for Innovation (i4i) Funding At the Speed of Translation (FAST) programme, which brings together leading quantum researchers, clinical experts and NIHR infrastructure to help promising technologies move more rapidly towards adoption in the NHS. The initiative also involves the two NIHR co-funded healthcare quantum research hubs, Q-BIOMED and QuSIT, alongside NHS research infrastructure specialising in quantum innovation.
The 17 funded projects span a broad range of healthcare applications, demonstrating the growing potential of quantum technologies to improve diagnosis, treatment and patient outcomes.
Among the projects receiving support are:
- Breast cancer imaging at Imperial College London, where researchers are using so-called "undetected photons" to create faster, noise-free images. The technology could help clinicians make more informed treatment decisions, reducing unnecessary chemotherapy and cutting testing costs for the NHS.
- Home monitoring for eye disease at Heriot-Watt University, where scientists are developing a compact device that enables patients with macular disease to monitor their eye health at home, reducing the need for hospital appointments and helping prevent sight loss.
- ICU risk prediction at University College London, where researchers are creating a hybrid quantum-classical decision support system capable of predicting critical events such as cardiac arrest in intensive care patients, enabling faster and more effective clinical interventions.
Professor Mike Lewis, NIHR Scientific Director for Innovation said:
"This funding is a major step forward in bringing quantum technology to patients, cementing the UK as Europe’s leader in quantum health innovation.
"By investing in these 17 projects, we are fast-tracking tools that can diagnose illness earlier and provide life-changing breakthroughs. These innovations will transform our health system and improve the lives of patients."
Health and Social Care Minister, Baroness Gillian Merron, added:
"Quantum technology has the potential to transform the way we prevent, diagnose and treat disease, helping patients receive faster, better care while supporting our mission to build an NHS fit for the future.
"Through this £1.65 million investment, we're backing some of the UK's brightest researchers to turn cutting-edge science into practical innovations that could help detect cancer earlier, support people to monitor long-term conditions from home, and give clinicians better tools to make life-saving decisions.
“This will also strengthen the UK's position as a global leader in quantum technologies, creating high-skilled jobs and supporting economic growth."
The latest funding forms part of the wider government ambition to modernise healthcare through advanced technologies and support the NHS's transition from analogue systems to digital healthcare delivery.
Quantum technologies are expected to play a significant role in the UK's future health and life sciences ecosystem, enabling unprecedented levels of precision in diagnostics, sensing and data analysis. Government plans set out in 2026 aim to position the UK as the first nation to deploy quantum computing at scale by the early 2030s, with the potential to contribute up to £200 billion to the UK economy by 2045.
Many of the newly funded projects focus on detecting disease earlier, improving clinical decision-making and shifting care closer to patients' homes. By supporting these innovations at an early stage, the NIHR hopes to create a strong pipeline of clinically relevant technologies capable of attracting further investment, supporting UK businesses and researchers, and ultimately improving productivity and outcomes across the NHS.
As quantum research moves closer to real-world healthcare applications, the latest NIHR funding signals growing confidence that the technology could become a major driver of future medical breakthroughs and NHS transformation.
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