University Hospital Southampton NHS Trust (UHS) is preparing to roll out the Netcall Patient Hub as an appointment portal across all of its departments from April.
Netcall said the move will provide patients with access to their appointment details from anywhere, support people with reading or visual impairments and reduce the use of paper.
It should also help the trust to improve its utilisation of freed appointments, and will provide telephone health advisors with a screen pop-up of all the relevant patient data at the start of a call.
Luke Robinson, digital outpatients programme director at UHS, said: “UHS currently sends 1 million appointment letters through the post and, when Patient Hub is fully rolled out, we will be offering all patients the option to be notified by text or email instead – which is quicker and more convenient for them, and also more cost-effective for the trust.
“The cost savings, estimated at £150,000-200,000 per year, are significant, but much more important is the powerful reporting, which shows us whether a patient has accepted their appointment or not – making it easier to identify which ones are going to attend, and which may need a further reminder.”
UHS is also aiming to integrate the Patient Hub with its My Medical Record clinical portal, which is designed to help patient with chronic illnesses manage their care.
Once the two portals are connected, patients should be able to review their appointments on the Hub then move to MyMedRec to check-in or upload relevant clinical information.
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