Patient and citizen involvement

The best use of ICT in patient and citizen involvement category of last year’s BT e-Health Insider awards was won by NHS Choices for a new media sexual health initiative in the Humber region. The runners up in the category sponsored by Fujitsu were Renal Patient View and an emergency contraception service piloted by NHS Direct.

Renal Patient View: Renal Information Exchange Group

Renal Patient View gives patients online access to information from their renal patient records, effectively providing them with an electronic personal care plan. It has been developed by the renal community through a multidisciplinary group with strong patient representation. Following pilots in 2005, Renal Patient View has been offered more widely and now has over 7,000 kidney patients online in 33 units covering over half of the UK’s renal patients, with continuing steady growth.

Pilot Emergency Contraception Service: NHS Direct

NHS Direct, England’s online and telephone-based healthcare information service, wanted to understand how it might integrate its existing multi-channel services with new digital technologies, particularly social networking websites and instant messaging. Emergency contraception was chosen for the pilot. The trial service was delivered by NHS Direct advisors who provided advice and information using Instant Messaging accessed through applets on: Bebo, Warwick University Health Centre website and parts of the NHS Direct website. The users evaluated the service very highly.