Chelsea and Westminster NHS Trust launches digital service for HIV patients

Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust has rolled out a digital service for HIV patients, aiming to transform their care.

The service, called Klick, has been developed by clinical and non-clinical staff together with HIV medicines and research company ViiV, and is intended to improve access to the most appropriate care.

The system uses digital tools to triage patients according to their clinical needs, and sits alongside a mobile app that patients can use to manage their appointments, complete health assessments, review results and communicate with healthcare professionals.

The service is being gradually rolled out to patients at one of the largest centres of HIV care in Europe, the trust’s Kobler Outpatient Clinic, and will be expanded to further sites in the next few months.

David Asboe, clinical director for HIV at Chelsea and Westminster, said there had been significant advances in care for people living with HIV.

“Our combined efforts have shifted HIV from an acute to a predominantly long-term condition,” he said. “This brings its own challenges and responsibilities. It is our duty to understand the emerging needs of our patient cohort, to design care that is responsive to these needs, and to provide care in a sustainable fashion.”

The digital service has been designed in response to the increasing demands on HIV healthcare services brought by the Covid-19 pandemic.

“We must achieve these things with a backdrop of the challenges we now also face with Covid-19,” said Asboe. “Health systems are under more pressure than ever and using new technologies in a way that genuinely enables our services to evolve is absolutely critical to ensuring we can continue to improve how we deliver quality care to our patients.”