If you go to hospital, or are taken into care, there are lots of things you might worry about - for example who will look after your pets, or take on your own caring responsibilities. It’s also important for staff to know what ‘normal’ looks like for you, and your needs and preferences for care, such as if you have any religious practices or obligations that you want to be respected. Care plans allow all of this information to be collated and shared with people that need it. But responsibilities, needs and preferences change, and this means that keeping care plans up to date is crucial if people are to receive the best experience. 

Previously the Universal Care Plan could only be updated with the help of a medical professional - leaving individuals dependent on waiting for a medical appointment to be able to change their information. Giving people the ability to add information themselves means individuals can have greater ownership over their care, and can free up staff time that would otherwise be spent making administrative changes. 

The PSC worked with the UCP team to help shape what safe and useful patient editable access should look like. We engaged with members of the public, patient representatives, clinicians, safeguarding leads, the UCP software supplier and the NHS App team to understand both the opportunity and the risks. 

The response was clear: patients and the public were excited about having more ownership over their care, and clinicians wanted people to contribute where it was safe to do so. At the same time, everyone recognised the importance of appropriate safeguards. Patient editable access does not mean unrestricted editing: clinical information and formal decisions remain professionally led, and patient-entered information is clearly identifiable through an audit history.

We turned these insights into a practical specification, setting out which fields the public should be able to view, which they should be able to edit, where guidance or controls were needed, and tested and iterated the content to ensure the language was appropriate and understood by individuals. The UCP team have now delivered this specification, marking the first time that the public can directly edit their care plans on the NHS App.
Patient editable access is more than a digital update. It is a shift towards care plans as living documents, shaped by patients and professionals together. The PSC is proud to have supported the UCP team on this important milestone for more personalised, joined-up care.

The PSC is a specialist management consultancy dedicated to making public services brilliant. If you would like to find out more about how we can support you to deliver digital services designed for and alongside users, get in touch with the team.