Major shake-up for hospital bookings and test results sent to your phone as Government launches plans to modernise NHS
NHS patients will soon be able to choose when and where they are treated in a new Deliveroo-style app.
Ministers are overhauling the NHS app so users can book the hospital or centre most convenient to them.
It is hoped the changes, which will come in by March, will help slash waiting lists and reduce money wasted on letters and missed appointments.
Here, Health Secretary Wes Streeting explains how the app will work . . .
WHEN I was diagnosed with kidney cancer, I was inundated by colleagues in Parliament asking who my surgeon was and where I was being treated.
They wanted to make sure I was receiving the best possible care.
As it happened, I had luckily been referred to a world class cancer surgeon. I owe Mr Ravi Barod my life.
We’re so fortunate to have people like him working in the NHS.
The well-informed and well-connected know what to expect when they receive a diagnosis, who the best doctors are, and their sharp elbows can push for the best.
The wealthy who pay for their treatment expect to receive their money’s worth.
But it would never occur to people like my mum, a cleaner, to ask the NHS for something better. So they miss out.
People today are used to convenience in their lives. At the touch of a button, we can order food, do our banking, or watch any film we want.
But the NHS is stuck in the age of top-down, one size fits all, like-it-or-lump-it public services.
The world has moved on. And if the NHS fails to modernise, people will start to lose faith in it.
It will go the way of Woolworths, a beloved national institution that failed to change with the times and died.
In the plan the Prime Minister is launching tomorrow, we are fighting back against this decline.
Our Elective Reform Plan will do two things to end the two-tier healthcare system in this country.
First, it will deliver on our pledge to cut the maximum time patients wait for treatment from 18 months to 18 weeks.
Second, it will give working-class patients the same choice, convenience and control over their healthcare as the wealthy enjoy.
Around 30million of us have the NHS app on our phones, but rarely do we use it.
We’re still more likely to receive invitations to appointments in a letter than via a notification.
If my phone can tell me what time my Deliveroo driver will arrive, it should be able to tell me when my hospital appointment is.
This is a massive opportunity to bring our analogue health service into the digital age.
PATIENT CHOICE
Our plan will make the app the digital front door to the NHS.
It will keep patients informed of when their appointments are and the next steps of their care.
It will give them the ability to book and rearrange appointments, so they can fit their healthcare around their lives, not the other way around.
This expansion of choice is crucial to the Government’s Plan For Change, to get the NHS back on its feet, and cut the longest waiting times from 18 months to 18 weeks.
Wes Streeting
And they will be able to choose whether they want to go into hospital, do their appointment over the phone or video call, when that’s appropriate.
We are also giving patients the chance to choose where they are treated.
Patients are supposed to have this today, but in practice fewer than one in four are ever shown options.
We will make sure every patient is given the chance to choose through the NHS app, online, or by their GP.
If you’d rather stick with your local hospital, you can.
If you can travel further down the road to be treated sooner, then you can choose to do that instead.
And if a private hospital has capacity to see you faster, then you can go there and the NHS will pay.
Private patients can choose when and where they are treated, now NHS patients will be able to as well.
This expansion of choice is crucial to the Government’s Plan For Change, to get the NHS back on its feet, and cut the longest waiting times from 18 months to 18 weeks.
At the same time as giving patients a choice of provider, we’re introducing new incentives for hospitals based on a simple principle — if you cut waiting times faster, you will be paid more.
The two reforms mean hospitals will have to up their service for patients, so they don’t miss out.
Our reforms are also part of this Government’s war on NHS waste.
Millions of patients fail to show up for NHS appointments a year — a huge waste when waiting lists stand at 7.6million. This is not a unique problem.
Restaurants miss out on income when customers fail to turn up for their reservation.
DIGITAL AGE
For years, the hospitality industry has been cutting down on no-shows by texting reminders and asking if the booking is still wanted.
It’s time for the NHS to learn from the private sector.
By giving patients the chance to cancel or rearrange, we will free up an extra million appointments for patients who need them.
Following my treatment for kidney cancer, I had follow-up scans to check it hadn’t returned.
I would then have to travel back to the hospital for an appointment, where I would be told my test results.
For me, it was mildly inconvenient. But for a self-employed patient or someone on a zero-hours contract, it can mean missing out on a day’s salary.
By notifying patients of routine test results over the app, patients’ time won’t be wasted, staff can see patients who really need them, and we can cut down on the millions of pounds the NHS spends every year on letters.
People who don’t use mobile phone apps will still be able to communicate with the NHS in the way they want.
In the six months we’ve been in office, this Government has already ended the junior doctors strikes, funded the recruitment of an extra 1,000 GPs on to the front line, and started to get waiting lists falling.
Tomorrow, the Prime Minister will launch a plan for investment and reform, to slash waiting times for patients and make the NHS fit for the future.