As of the end of April the NHS App has gone live with new features.
Hospital patients at every NHS trust across England can now check their referrals and appointments, offering a more centralised health journey experience.
The App already offers services such as test results, prescriptions, patient records, and patient messaging, and has undergone a navigation overhaul in recent months.
Finding these appointments from the home page will also be easier with a navigation update. Dan Collins, Senior Product Manager on the NHS App, led “one of the most significant updates to the NHS App since its launch”.
He said: “The new Information Architecture (the way services and information are organised in the app) is now available across England, making it simpler, more intuitive, and easier to navigate.”
As of the feature update from the end of April, the App is now linked up to every acute NHS trust in England, and around two-thirds (64%) of all hospital appointments are currently visible through the app.
Many patients are also able to reschedule or cancel appointments, and about half of trusts are offering push notifications of appointments.
NHS England’s (NHSE) hope behind this is that it will “cut the number of missed appointments”.
The new feature should also reduce the need for paper letters and texts. NHSE hopes this will also reduce admin demands, making work in hospitals more efficient.
Around 41 million people are now registered with the NHS App, with over 15 million users logging in in March alone. This is up by almost a third year on year. Prescription ordering through the app also rose by more than a third.
Fewer missed appointments means more patients getting the treatment they need, sooner
Jules Hunt, Director General of Technology, Digital and Data for the NHS, said: “Millions of patients across England can now easily access information about their hospital referrals and appointments through the NHS App, giving them more control and choice about their care and cutting out unnecessary paperwork.
“This is a great example of how we’re transforming patients’ experience of healthcare and harnessing digital technology as part of the Government’s 10 Year Health Plan.
Dr Zubir Ahmed, Health Innovation and Safety Minister, said: “With patients at every hospital now able to view their referrals and appointments, and millions more ordering prescriptions and receiving health messages digitally, we are cutting the admin burden while helping to drive down waiting lists.
“Fewer missed appointments means more patients getting the treatment they need, sooner. The NHS App is central to our ambition of shifting the NHS from analogue to digital and giving the patient more control – and we’re only just starting there.”
What is the future of the NHS App?
New features planned for the NHS App over the next year include follow-up appointment requests and access to specialist care through the NHS’s new online hospital.
NHS Online, which will see its first patients next year, will transform and modernise the delivery of healthcare by providing triage for patients through the NHS App as well as video consultations with doctors.
NHS Online will see its first patients next year
The service will speed up specialist care by digitally connecting patients with expert clinicians across England, no matter where they are in the country, providing faster access to treatments.
The NHS App has also recently been updated to make it simpler, more intuitive and easier to navigate, with key services like prescriptions, appointments and test results quicker to find from the new homepage.