A city centre surgery is helping its patients get to grips with the NHS App by running patient drop-in sessions.
The NHS App contains all a patient’s records and letters, makes ordering medication easy and tells you when to collect it from the chemist.
St Stephen’s Gate Medical Practice is running support sessions where staff help set up and explain how the app works.
Dozens have been helped in the popular sessions – with the oldest person helped so far aged 92.
Owen Berry, part of the IT team at the practice, said: “We’ve really enjoyed helping people use and set up the NHS app. It’s a great and intuitive tool for managing your own healthcare.
“People do worry it’s too difficult to use or not user friendly, but once you get it set up, it’s as simple as a few taps to order your medications – plus, you can then see when that request is ready to collect!
“It’s always worth giving the app a go at home, but if it doesn’t quite work or you’re feeling overwhelmed – were always happy to help.”
Kyran Foster, from Patient Services, said: “We’ve helped all sorts of people and it’s been great to see people come in a little worried, and leave with a smile because it is actually really useful and easy to use.
“The oldest patient I’ve helped was 92 and she was very happy to have autonomy and control of her own medical services in her pocket. It’s great to see people go from worry to delight in a few minutes.”
Kelly Lewis, Operations Manager, said: “We need to move away from paper scripts because it can cause errors and take longer to action. These requests don’t have an audit trail and often the requests are unclear.
“We are supporting very vulnerable patients by ordering on their behalf and also supporting everyone else to transition to the NHS App, including carers and family members who can order on patients’ behalf.”
Drop-in sessions are being run every Wednesday and Thursday until the end of September at the Wessex Street site between 1pm and 3pm and there is also plenty of help on the NHS website, www.nhs.uk/nhs-app/nhs-app-help-and-support