NHSE explores home testing via NHS App for new conditions

NHS England is exploring plans to enable patients to order tests, complete them and receive results at home via the NHS App.

These tests could cover seven specialities, including checks for liver function, cholesterol, sexually transmitted diseases, prostate cancer, rheumatology, women’s fertility issues, and the MRSA superbug.

It is hoped the move will make it easier to access basic checks and save patients having to visit their GP to monitor their health.

Wes Streeting, health secretary, told Digital Health News: “We want to give patients more control over their own healthcare. Home testing has real potential to make diagnosis faster and more convenient.

“Getting tested shouldn’t mean unnecessarily taking time off work to travel to a clinic, if it can be as simple as picking up your phone.

“People today expect services delivered to their doorstep, and patients expect that kind of service from a modern NHS too.

“So, we’re exploring what’s possible with self-sampling technology, building on what we already offer for HIV and bowel cancer, with a view to expanding this exciting new technology to more patients.”

Self-sampling involves patients collecting a sample, such as blood or urine, at home and sending it to an accredited laboratory for analysis.

The Department of Health and Social Care told Digital Health News that no commitment has been made to a national rollout or to any specific conditions, but HSJ reported that the NHS has “aspirations” of launching a basic version of the programme from April.

Malte Gerhold, senior adviser at management consultancy PPL, said on LinkedIn: “This is great news, to drive forward a different NHS care at home experience, in a way that more people will experience directly.

“It may surface again, though, the tension between advancing this transformation more quickly, and what it means for the supplier market – as for a centralised approach there’s likely to be winners and losers among suppliers of such at home diagnostics.”

Rachel Hope, director of digital prevention services at NHS England, said at the Digital Health Rewired conference in March that the NHS App will shift to becoming a personalised health companion over the next few years.

She said that this would include improved access to screening, vaccinations, and health checks through the app, with HPV and HIV home testing to be introduced over the next year.

“We’re trying to make sure we’re improving access to population-level public health interventions, while at the same time personalising it to the person, so it’s easier for them to find and access those,” Hope said.

Earlier this month, NHSE awarded IBM a £160.1 million contract to support the development of the NHS App.

Digital Health News contacted NHSE for comment.