East London GP surgery introduces text message service for patients

East-London residents are now able to receive direct text messages from their GP.

Woodgrange Medical Practice in Forest Gate, Newham, has introduced AccuRx’s Chain SMS, a service which allows GPs to send text messages directly to patients, reducing the need for letters and phone calls.

Over a three-month period the Woodgrange team, GPs, nurses and admin staff, sent almost 5,000 SMS messages through AccuRx, saving about two hours’ clinical and administrative time per day.

Chris Riley, IT Project Manager at Newham CCG, said: “We have been working with all our local GP practices to implement digital innovations, such as AccuRx, in order to deliver a modern GP service that is fit for the future.

“We believe that having surgeries such as Woodgrange championing the introduction of new software helps to maximise its use and fully demonstrate the benefits of a more efficient, technology-driven service.

“We are committed to continuing to work with local practices to introduce and implement high-quality services for local people.”

UK start-up, AccuRx, launched Chain SMS in February 2018 and it is now used in 1,400 GP practices across England.

The company recently announced it had raised £8.8million in funding to go towards getting Chain SMS into more GP practices.

The investment is being led by Atomico with participation from LocalGlobe and Entrepreneur First.