NHS trusts to be measured on electronic services adoption

NHS trusts will be measured on their adoption of electronic services and NHS App integration, according to new guidance from NHS England.

The medium term planning framework, published by NHSE on 24 October 2025, states that NHS trusts must implement “all core national products and services specified in the forthcoming national product adoption dashboard” by the end of 2027/28.

This includes “deploying the Electronic Prescription Service, deploying the Electronic Referral Service APIs, consolidating NHS.Net Connect into the national collaboration service, and integrating all existing NHS App capabilities”.

Providers must also adopt NHS App capabilities as a priority, making at least 95% of appointments available via the NHS App across all care settings from April 2026 in line with the NHS 10 year health plan.

The guidance sets out plans to ensure that 85% of people with a cancer diagnosis receive their first treatment within two months of a referral – up from 70% today.

NHSE says this will be achieved by transforming service delivery and improving productivity, with hospitals financially incentivised to ensure more patients are treated in the community and actions to deliver same day GP appointments.

Wes Streeting, health secretary, said: “Millions more patients will be treated on time, with better cancer outcomes and quicker access to GPs.

“The NHS will be brought into the digital age, and community care will be given the priority it deserves.”

NHSE said that all direct-to-patient communication services must move to NHS Notify, exploiting NHS App-based ‘push’ notifications as the preferred method of contact with local agreements terminated by the end of 2029/29.

Meanwhile, providers must be onboarded to the NHS Federated Data Platform (FDP) and use its core products to support elective recovery, cancer, and urgent and emergency care.

NHSE adds that trusts should use the FDP for “data warehousing and implement the canonical data model” whilst “ICBs should use the population health management suite of tools from the FDP for strategic commissioning and adopt the FDP System Coordination Centre” by 2028/29.

“Those providers leaning heavily into the digital agenda are already achieving substantial performance improvements and cash-releasing productivity benefits.

“For example, acute trusts leveraging the NHS Federated Data Platform have achieved an average increase of 114 elective surgeries per month per trust and a 35% reduction in delayed discharge days,” the guidance says.

Trusts are also being told to “deploy ambient voice technology (AVT) at pace, with due regard to the national AVT registry” and adopt digital therapeutics for supportive and wrap-around care, as well as for direct clinical delivery where services have the appropriate regulatory approvals.

Sir Jim Mackey, chief executive at NHSE, said that the guidance “resets how the NHS works, aligns incentives to delivering more care and creates a clear route map by which the NHS can meet its commitments on improving access to care and get waiting times back to where patients want and need them to be.”

Commenting on the plans, Carmelo Insalaco, chief executive, of AI-driven clinical triage firm Rapid Health, said: “Setting a clear target, that 95% of appointments after triage should be available through the NHS App by 2028, is really positive.

“But waiting three years to hit this target is delaying primary care access improvements for patients unnecessarily.”

Julian Coe, managing director, X-on Health, said: “As the NHS moves toward its 10 year plan ambitions, the planning framework sets some clear, and rightly ambitious targets. For technologies like AVT, this represents a huge opportunity.”