Type 2 Diabetes is a condition that requires a close partnership between patient and health care professionals in order for people to be able to live well with the condition.
But the National Health Service (NHS) of England found that people living with Type 2 Diabetes in South London find it hard to get the support they need to help them manage their health and meet their personal health and wellbeing goals… goals with long-term consequences.
This unfortunate reality results in poorer health outcomes for patients, frustration for the healthcare professionals responsible for their care, and rising costs to the health economy.
Early in 2019, Citizen Communications, a specialist Health and Care sector communications consultancy whose mission is to create more active communities, partnered with NHS England to create a project called You & Type 2.
The project’s goal is to help people live more easily with Type 2 Diabetes, through the delivery of a more personalised care planning service, that supports and motivates patients to engage with their health care plans more consistently and effectively and, in so doing, achieve the health and wellbeing goals that matter most to them.
You & Type 2 combines a range of existing services and new technologies and proven behavioural change approaches to ensure that more patients have digitally supported, personalised and dynamic care plans that are easily and conveniently accessed on mobile devices, providing “one click” access to all the services and support available to them.
The care plans are co-produced between the patient and their trusted healthcare professional as part of a structured care and support planning process, which helps ensure that the goals of the plan are sensible and achievable within the context of the patient’s day-to-day life.
As a critical component of the plan, Citizen Communications turned to Idomoo’s Personalised Video as a Service PVaaS™ platform and to British Telecom to create a series of data-driven, personalised video messages that were delivered directly to people’s mobile devices via links in text messages or instant messaging services.
Handling potentially sensitive patient data can be challenging, but Idomoo provided all the required assurances: Even though all patient data was anonymised, it still benefited from several layers of additional security provided by Idomoo’s ISO 27001 Infosec certified platform.
The videos simplified communication of complex health information like test results, and highlighted relevant health and lifestyle services information specific to the individual’s goals at that moment in their journey.
Once downloaded to the patient’s mobile devices the videos can be viewed and shared according to the patient’s preference. By using the latest thinking in Behavioural Science (“Nudge” theory) through the videos, patients are encouraged to think about the things that most matter to them in terms of their health and wellbeing and to access the services and support that are already available to them.
“This is the first time anywhere in the world that Personalised Video Messaging has been used in this way to support the routine delivery of health care services,” said Citizen Communications Managing Director Allen McKay. Initial patient feedback to the personalised videos has been immensely positive with comments such as ‘This was really useful, the NHS has moved forward by using these videos they are the future’ and ‘I showed it to my family they don’t all speak English, but now they know what help I need’”.
By delivering healthcare education, through Personalised Video Messaging, Citizen Communications are able to support NHS England in ‘nudging’ people in South London living with Type 2 Diabetes toward making and sustaining behaviour change.
