Bringing the NHS into the digital age
NHS Choices provides innovative digital media solutions, builds partnerships and leads national policy delivery to improve health and social care outcomes and effectively improves the spread of NHS information.
How we do this
The strategy and digital media programme works with the NHS, private and third sector partners, combining knowledge of the digital market with social marketing expertise and local insights to create innovative and result-driven interventions.
Success stories
NHS Choices delivered an online mental wellbeing pilot – the first of its kind in the UK – in partnership with the University of Warwick and the Australia National University. 2,000 participants were able to access the cognitive behavioural therapy tool at their convenience, 24 hours a day, and reported an improvement in their mental wellbeing.
Our pioneering approach to partnerships has generated mobile phone applications and podcasts. We have worked with companies including BlackBerry and Nokia to develop a way to surface NHS Choices content through mobile handsets. Our BMI tracker has become of the of the most popular weight management tools in the Apple Store, and Couch to 5K, our running podcast, has been downloaded more than 2 million times.
We continue to lead the way in providing the means to reach specific groups using digital technology. To tackle health problems among the prison population, we have worked with prisons in Derbyshire to enable access to digital health information through interactive kiosks. Female prison inmates learned about symptoms of hepatitis C, while male prisoners used semi-diagnostic kiosks to get personalised health checks.
Making the patient revolution a reality, NHS Choices has introduced a new facility for patients to comment on their hospital experience via terminals at their bedside. Working with Patient Opinion and Hospedia, patients at Broomfield Hospital in Essex were able to leave real-time feedback about their care and experiences, a move welcomed both by users and hospital staff.
We work with the Department of Health to support strategies through digital technology and policy knowledge. We continue to build and host a range of flagship health campaign sites including Dementia, Act F.A.S.T. on stroke, and Change4Life. Our digital expertise remains instrumental in the success of these high-profile public health campaigns.
Want to know more?
If you are interested in enhancing the health agenda in your area through digital media, want to partner with the NHS, or need advice on how to use digital tools effectively, please contact the NHS Choices helpdesk at thechoicesteam@nhschoices.nhs.uk.
