With the support of Digital Health Uptake.
There were three DigitalHealthUptake-supported sessions. The first DigitalHealthUptake-supported session was dedicated to the adoption and upscaling of digital health services. It shed light on strategies to facilitate the widespread acceptance and integration of digital health solutions at health system level and collaboration among healthcare providers, patients, and other key stakeholders in order to overcome barriers to adoption and ensure scalability.
Two speakers provided experiences and insights from country-wide implementations of digital health solutions.
Scaling up Digital Mental Health in Scotland
Chris Wright, National Advisor and Lead for Digital Mental Health of the Scottish Government
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First, Chris Wright presented “Scaling up Digital Mental Health in Scotland”. He shared with the audience the experience of deploying digital mental health services nationwide and the lessons learned from such a large-scale implementation. Digital mental health services have skyrocketed in recent years and not only due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Currently, one-third of referrals to psychologists in Scotland are digital. More than 18,000 consultations take place every month across all areas of Scotland and they are evaluated as having a high satisfaction level.
Several key considerations were highlighted, when implementing digital solutions at a national scale. From a governance perspective, Chris underlined various factors: the alignment of mental health and digital health strategies, the organisational structures that led the transformation, the delivery mechanism, and the structured approach to transformation. Changing cultures over time, through strong partnerships among core stakeholders, was fundamental. These partnerships include policymakers, industrial partners, National Health Service (NHS) Health boards, NHS24, NHS Education Scotland, primary care organisations, and third sector organisations.
This presentation helps support the Digital Health Uptake stakeholder input to an executive digest on digital mental health skills.
Empowering Catalonia: Promoting healthcare equity through upscaling of digital solutions
Berta Llebot, Bioengineer at TIC Salut Social from Catalonia, Spain
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Berta Llebot described how healthcare equity through upscaling digital solutions is being promoted in Catalonia. Engaging people in health promotion and shared decision-making is a pre-requisite for a prevention-oriented health system.
More than 60% of hospitals offer digital services through mobile apps or web portals. Through these channels, the services most offered in public hospitals are cancellation of appointments (63%), surgery progress (43%) and emergency room waiting times (37%). In private hospitals, most often offered are integrated video consultations (93%).
TIC Salut Social and CatSalut (Catalonia’s public health payer) are collaborating to launch a Methodological Guide for developers to include patient-centred digital health solutions in La Meva Salut, the citizens' personal health record.
Berta shared three take home messages: (1) the importance of a broad analysis of available solutions to shed light on usability and avoid duplicating already existing solutions, (2) the need for quality references and certification, and (3) the inclusion of digital health solutions in a citizen space represented by the personal health record.
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Tino Marti, from EHTEL, moderated the debate on how to ensure the involvement of important stakeholders, especially primary care providers, in lengthy implementation processes. Speakers also discussed how to scale-up digital health solutions that have proven clinical value in local settings and how evaluation contributes to generate trust and reduce resistance.
The session showed how the Digital Health Uptake project is supporting knowledge communities to exchange adoption and upscale insights.
