NHS England recruiting for ‘exceptional’ chair for online hospital

NHS England has begun recruitment for a chair for its online hospital NHS Online, which will be established as a trust in June 2026.

Prime minister Keir Starmer announced in September 2025 that the NHS would be launching an online hospital to digitally connect patients to expert clinicians across England.

A job advert, posted by recruitment agency Saxton Bampfylde, says that NHS Online is “being established as the NHS’s first national, digital-first trust to address some of the most pressing challenges in elective care in England”.

It adds that the online hospital will be formally established on 1 June 2026, with clinical services launching in 2027/2028, and will operate as a regulated NHS trust accountable to the public and Parliament and inspected by the Care Quality Commission.

The online hospital will be accessed through the NHS App and is planned to “align clinical capacity with patient demand across England and support more flexible workforce participation”.

NHS England is seeking to appoint “an exceptional chair to lead NHS Online from its establishment and into full operation”, who will work one day a week with an annual salary of £55,000.

“This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to shape a national NHS trust with the potential to transform elective care and improve health outcomes for populations across England.

“The chair will bring experience of leading complex organisations at scale, ideally within digital-first or technology-enabled environments, and the credibility to guide a highly visible, system-critical innovation,” the job advert states.

NHS Online is expected to deliver the equivalent of up to 8.5 million appointments and assessments in its first three years post launch, “freeing physical capacity across local providers for patients who need or prefer in-person care and representing one of the most ambitious service innovations undertaken by the NHS in recent decades”.

“Conceived by NHS England as a system-level intervention, it will deliver high-quality, clinically rigorous elective care unconstrained by geography, estate or traditional workforce models.

“Its ambition is transformational rather than incremental: to operate at national scale, set standards for virtual elective care, and directly contribute to elective recovery,” the advert adds.

Recruitment has also begun for six “exceptional and mission-driven non-executive directors”, who join the board of NHS Online from its establishment, helping to shape it into a fully operational provider of virtual elective care services.

The non-executive directors “will set strategic direction, uphold the highest standards of quality, safety and probity, and ensure the trust delivers sustainable public value,” the job advert says.

A full board is expected to be in place by the end of December 2026, according to a candidate pack included in the job advert.

Earlier this month, NHS England announced that menopause and menstrual problems which may be a sign of endometriosis or fibroids, are among nine common conditions to be treated by the service.

NHS Online’s other initial priorities are glaucoma, medical retina (including age-related macular degeneration), cataracts, inflammatory bowel disease, iron deficiency anaemia, prostate enlargement and raised prostate-specific antigen.