NHS App to become national channel for the ‘shift to prevention’ 

The NHS App is planned to become the central national channel for delivering preventative healthcare, said Rachel Hope, director of digital prevention services at NHS England.

Moving from ‘treatment to prevention’ is one of the three major shifts in the government’s NHS 10 year health plan, with an ambition to halve the gap in healthy life expectancy between the richest and poorest regions, while increasing it for everyone, and raising the healthiest generation of children ever.

Speaking at a Digital Health webinar on 6 January 2026, Hope spoke about how preventing ill health could pay a “triple dividend” for society.

“It’s about healthier people, a healthier economy and healthier finances,” she said, highlighting that almost 2.8 million people are currently out of the workforce due to long-term sickness.

Hope said that the scale and engagement of the NHS App makes it ideal for reaching citizens directly with preventative interventions such as vaccinations, screening and digital health checks.

The app has around 3.6 million active users every month, with the number of users increasing in winter months, a reach which most commercial organisations would love to have, Hope added.

However, she said that it was important that national digital services do more than just notify people about their eligibility for preventative services and point them toward local provision.

“We need to get out of this mindset of integration with local services being about signposting.” she said.

The ambition is for national platforms such as the NHS App to support prevention services end-to-end, including helping users to complete referrals and ensuring that information flows back into local systems.

Hope emphasised that national digital services and local prevention initiatives should operate in parallel, with the NHS App acting as a “surface layer” that enables local delivery rather than replacing it.

“The NHS App needs to allow for local prevention services to integrate really deeply.

“It’s absolutely pivotal that whatever happens with these national products and services, they really support and help propel forward local initiatives.”

Gary McAllister, chief technology officer at Dell and former NHS national digital leader, highlighted the scale of opportunity created by national platforms.

“I think it’s a real opportunity for the NHS to lead the way and then provide tools in the NHS App to encourage our citizens to live better and eat better,” he said.

He also pointed to the role of data flowing between national and local systems, adding: “Having a record that moves with you is quite important and we are slightly behind the times in comparison to other nations when it comes to having a national record of sorts.”

Andrew Poole, head of data science and AI for NHS Dorset, said that national tools must be matched with strong local systems capable of acting on the data.

“There is almost a national effort of enabling the individual to manage these tools and engage with these areas, and locally we’re developing systems.

“If that data can feed into that process, then we’ve not only got individual management, but we’ve got the system looking after the individual as well.”

Meanwhile, in January 2026, digital technology firm Kainos, alongside a consortium of smaller companies, secured a contract to improve access to vaccinations and screenings through the NHS App and accelerate the delivery of personalised healthcare.

Watch the full webinar ‘Digital tools proven to shift to wellness and prevention’ here.