Patients must help design digital services, says The King’s Fund

  • 30 January 2025
Patients must help design digital services, says The King’s Fund
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  • The King’s Fund has called for patient engagement around digital health technologies to be more than just a “tick box exercise”
  • In the long-read, published on 30 January 2025, the think tank says that NHS patients struggle with aspects of digital health care
  • The report highlights five key areas to ensure digital services are created collaboratively with the public

The King’s Fund has called for patient engagement around digital health technologies to be more than just a “tick box exercise” if the government is to achieve its aspiration to shift from analogue to digital. 

In the long-read, ‘Designing inclusive and trusted digital services with people and communities’, published on 30 January 2025, the think tank says that NHS patients struggle with aspects of digital health care.

It cites having multiple apps with siloed records, fragmented digitalisation, a lack of digital options, and insufficient accessibility features, as among the issues faced by patients.

“Current digitalisation and transformation approaches often fail to adequately involve users in service development, leading to unmet needs and expectations,” the article says.

The report, commissioned by the Health Foundation, follows Lord Darzi’s independent investigation into the state of the NHS in England, published in September 2024, which found that the patient voice is not sufficiently heard.

To address this, The King’s Fund recommends that practical action is taken to address digital exclusion for socio-economically disadvantaged groups, socially excluded groups, and older adults who struggle to access care.

However it adds that this needs to be combined with building public confidence in digital solutions, adding that “designing services with user involvement isn’t routinely done”.

“Previous work from The King’s Fund showed that it’s not just people who are digitally excluded who struggle with digitally enabled services but also those who are more digitally confident.

“Getting these services right means listening to and acting upon the voices of patients and communities,” it says.

The report highlights five key areas to ensure digital services are created collaboratively with the public, which include avoiding “tick-box engagement”.

“Services often fail to meet user needs because of a lack of meaningful user involvement.

“Time and budget pressures can reduce engagement to a rushed tick-box exercise that uses small groups or non-inclusive methods,” it says.

It adds that it is important to ensure people feel valued throughout participation and that materials and engagement methods are inclusive.

The King’s Fund also emphasises the importance of balancing power dynamics which can be a barrier to patent engagement.

“This is particularly pronounced in digital service design, where complex or unfamiliar technological aspects of digital services can create a divide between those who are leading and participating in design and those who are less digitally literate, leaving some people feeling unconfident about taking part,” the report says.

To help combat this, it recommends making sure that people are involved right from the start of the project and meeting people in environments which are familiar to them when possible.

The report also highlights the need for staff to be supported by leaders to carry out engagement work and to receive training on engagement methods and facilitation skills.

To find out more you can read the full report here.

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