Text reminders for cervical cancer screening in London
This is an NHS initiative to use text message technology to send out reminders to patients invited to cervical cancer screening in order to increase coverage for cervical cancer screening.
Background
- Cervical cancer screening in London has declined from 70.3% in 2014 to 64.1% in March 2018.
- London has the lowest cervical cancer screening coverage in the country at 65.7%, compared to 72.0% in England.
- NHSE has commissioned iPLATO to support the Cervical Cancer Screening Programme using their text messaging platform called iPLATO Connect.
How will it work?
- Practices will need to allow iPLATO to connect to the clinical system to participate and connection protocols differ slightly between the clinical systems. All setup will be handled remotely by the iPLATO Support team and the process will require a minimal amount of assistance from the GP Practice (5-10mins).
- The Cervical Screening Administration Service who provide the call-recall service (on behalf of NHS England), will send the NHS numbers of women invited to cervical screening to iPLATO.
- iPLATO will use these NHS numbers to identify and extract the mobile numbers to send the reminder text message approximately 2 and a half weeks (or 12 working days) after the invitation letter is sent.
The text wording will be as follows:
[GP SURGERY NAME]: Your cervical smear test is due. Call [GP number] to book. Info at www.nhs.uk/conditions/cervical-screening/. Privacy notice: www.england.nhs.uk/contact-us/privacy-notice/how-we-use-your-information/our-services/public-health/. Contact your GP to opt out of SMS.