Digital Access – a ‘front door to the NHS’
Introduction
Digital Access means GP practice’s getting their digital ‘front door’ right for patients, so that the various elements and digital tools available, will support patients to understand how to access services online. Many people may not be familiar or confident with using online options or understand the breadth of support now available; patients need guidance and support to better understand what tools to utilise for their specific needs.
It is also important that practices relay the message that they understand that not everyone is able or wants to utilise digital technology and that the key principle remains that all patients will have equal access regardless of the way by which they contact their practice.
The core elements of Digital Access (Digital Front door) are:
- telephone (advanced cloud based telephony)
- GP practice website
- online consultation tools to register healthcare questions with General Practice
- video consultations to conduct Appointments with patients
- NHS APP – Online access including amending, booking and cancelling Appointments, repeat prescriptions, viewing patients’ records, reviewing test results and ordering fit notes
- SMS – 2-way messaging – viewing and responding to messages
- helping patients to use online services effectively is crucial to avoid them defaulting to the ‘telephone first’ Approach. GP practices should guide patients to know what sort of problem they may require being ‘triaged’ first and what kind of medical requests can be directly booked online, without needing triage; this is important both at the point of need and for future needs. FutureNHS offers multiple resources to support GP practices with implementing digital transformation including, Digital Access, Online consulting systems and support for Digital and Transformation Leads
Signposting to other services in the community is essential, especially when the practice is closed or when it is more Appropriate for patients to use other services that can meet their needs. Doing this will maximise the use of NHS services, helping to distribute the workload so that demand is spread across primary care services to best serve the needs of patients and does not just fall to General Practice alone. GP practices can use digital communications to reach people before they need to access services.