Patient Hub launched in NHS Highland

19th March 2022

NHS Highland has started implementing Patient Hub to assist with our administration for patient services. This is a secure online patient portal providing you with information relating to your care at the click of a button.

The portal, once fully operational, will allow patients to access information related to their hospital appointments. It can be accessed using your smart phone, tablet or computer.

The implementation of this new system will be complex and will take time.

The first phase of the implementation will be introducing the waiting list management system. This relates to new appointments, also known as referrals, for patients. By new we mean you have been referred but are still waiting for your first appointment with the service.

The first department to progress to going live with the new system will be the Neurology service.

Patients with a new referral into the Neurology Service will be contacted by text or email detailing that they are on the waiting list. Patients will only be contacted when they have been waiting for a specified number of weeks - this will be different for every speciality.

Patients who are waiting will be presented with a number of options:

· I still want my appointment
· I still want my appointment but wish to delay
· I no longer want my appointment

Once the patient selects the option they want their information will be uploaded and made immediately visible to our dedicated administrators in the Patient Booking Service (PBS) who will manage this centrally at Raigmore Hospital.

Katherine Sutton, Chief Officer, from NHS Highland said: "Waiting lists for new outpatient appointments have grown due to the COVID pandemic which resulted in non-urgent activity being temporarily suspended. We now seek to address that and want to ensure all appointments are utilised for patients needing treatment.

“The waiting list validation system will allow patients the opportunity to digitally contact us and confirm whether they still require an appointment. Patients have told us they would like easier ways to communicate with us and this is one of the ways we are helping to facilitate this request.

“Validating our lists will have a number of benefits including reducing our waiting lists and reducing the number of DNA (did not attend) appointments. It is a system that we will be introducing slowly and on an incremental basis and we are confident patients will benefit from this new way of working."

The system is expected to go live on March 18th 2022. Patients will receive a text / email from NHS-NoReply and are asked to follow the instructions contained in the message.