NHS Digital launches online community for API developers

IT professionals who work to integrate systems with national healthcare services are being invited to join a new online tech community by NHS Digital.

The platform aims to support API developers and give them a forum in which to share ideas and solutions more easily. It helps to lower the barriers to information for the tech community and provide accessible support.

The online space is open to anyone who wants to integrate with NHS Digital’s Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) platform. The API platform provides a set of products and services which can be used to easily build and integrate with national systems.

An NHS Digital survey found that 76% of the platform users were in favour of a well-supported official NHS forum to give them the tools, support and help to carry out their roles. As a result, the developer community was launched.

There are currently over 200 users signed up to the platform. NHS Digital’s goal is to build a growing community of users who can share their knowledge and experience in a safe and open way. New users can sign up to the developer community at Developer hub (digital.nhs.uk).

Ernest Kissiedu, NHS Digital business analyst, said: “We realised we could improve the way we do things by providing an open forum to create a sense of community among our API developers.

“We were offering developer support to API Product teams using email, MS Teams, and Slack channels. But every week, we were receiving the same queries relating to the same issues, such as getting started on NHS Digital APIs, accessing our path to live environments, and onboarding.

“By answering these questions in an open forum, we realised more people would be able to see the solutions to these problems.”

Anyone is able to browse or search for answers to queries through the developer community. In addition, those who have developer hub accounts are also able to post and respond to other threads on the forum.

Shan Rahulan, director of platforms for core services at NHS Digital, said: “We want all our users to get involved and for new ones to sign up too, to help shape the future of the developer community by providing feedback on NHS products and services.

“The long-term vision for the community is to make it easier for the health and care system to access support, insight, and knowledge. By creating an open environment, we hope people in the community will come together to help each other and share their experiences.”

NHS Digital is set to complete its merger into NHS England’s transformation directorate this month. Interim CEO of the organisation, Simon Bolton, will step down once the merger takes place.