Hertfordshire Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust (HPFT) has gone live with the Patients Know Best (PKB) platform in its mental health services.
The rollout provides people under the care of adult community mental health teams in Hertfordshire direct access to their health information, marking a milestone in the trust’s digital transformation within the newly formed Central East Integrated Care Board.
By moving to digital-first processes, the trust aims to empower service users, identify potential mental health deterioration earlier, and reduce the administrative burden on clinical staff.
Hillary Mitchell, chief innovation and improvement officer at HPFT, said: “We want to make it easier for people to access information about their care in a way that works for them.
“By partnering with PKB, service users can view their mental health appointments in the NHS App, something they told us was important when developing our Digital Strategy for 2025–2030.
“People who do not use digital services will still receive information by text message or post, so everyone can access the information they need.
“We hope that expanding our digital services will make things easier for service users and give staff more time to focus on delivering high-quality care.”
The transition from the initial project kick-off to a live service was achieved in just seven weeks, a timeline driven by the trust’s commitment to delivering NHS England’s Wayfinder programme.
Since the go live, the trust has onboarded with NHS App Wayfinder screens for appointments and appointment notifications and messages and started sharing digital letters via a hybrid mail workflow.
The launch has seen a high level of engagement from service users, with more than 50% of their invited patient cohort registered in the first six months.
Chris Marsh, head of customer operations at PKB, said: “We’re delighted to be working with Hertfordshire Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust.
“As our first trust in Hertfordshire this partnership is particularly exciting.
“The contract reinforces our expertise and leadership in the sector, but crucially, it provides service users with a borderless health record.
“This means they can manage all their health data in one place, which remains accessible to them if they are seen by any other trust already integrated with the PKB platform.”
The trust underwent a workshop and patient engagement exercise to develop a bespoke PKB roadmap informed by staff and user feedback.
In the longer term, HPFT plans to expand its use of PKB’s clinical transformation functionality embedded within the NHS App, including shared care planning, symptom tracking, and a personalised digital library of resources.
As the first platform to introduce the Wayfinder service with tailored screens for mental health, PKB is now used by over a third of mental health trusts across England, with a contract signed with Derbyshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust.
Meanwhile, clinical research organisation Clerkenwell Health announced earlier this month that it has partnered with PKB to identify and recruit patients for clinical trials using their health records.
