NHS Direct Online: Relieving pressure on front-line services

How the web can be used to revolutionise personal service by allying its strengths to consumer preferences.

The Site

NHS Direct Online is the web arm of the UK National Health Service’s public information and advice provision. Its home page sets out to deal with three main lines of enquiry: finding out more about an illness or condition; searching for information about local NHS services; and identifying why you’re not feeling well.

The third option, “Not feeling well?”, links to a self-help guide that covers common symptoms. Enquirers are directed to an interactive Body Key that guides them to one of four sections (Head and chest, Abdomen, Limbs and Skin). Here they can select a complaint, and answer a set of questions to determine whether they should try to heal themselves, ring the emergency services, call NHS Direct or do nothing. Each option has supplementary advice, for example, on details to have ready if telephoning for further assistance.

The Takeaway

NHS Direct shows how the web can be used to revolutionise personal (in this case patient) service by allying its strengths as a medium to consumer preferences. To complete a virtuous circle, it is also relieving pressure on its physical services at the point of initial contact.

The self-help guide combines interactivity with a large, specialised database that reflects the most commonly-held complaints recorded by the NHS. By getting patients to diagnose themselves on the website it taps into the fast-growing use of the web as a personal research tool. At the same time, it meets a growing preference among the British public for ‘self-diagnostic’ health products and services. The market for self-diagnostic devices (blood sugar monitors, blood pressure testers, thermometers, etc) has grown 32% over the past five years, according to Mintel, with about two in three Britons owning at least one.

Long waiting lists and inconvenient surgery hours are credited for the rise along with a greater desire to catch health problems early. In tapping into this and the web usage trend NHS Direct Online can meet the demand while also helping to alleviate pressure on doctors and hospitals.

First published on 30 October, 2003