NHS app hits 30 million downloads amid organ donation decision surge
The NHS app has surpassed a new milestone after being downloaded 30 million times amid a surge in people registering to make organ donation decisions.
The app, which was first piloted four years ago, has proved to be incredibly popular due to its versatile feature set, which allows UK patients to make appointments with a GP and order prescriptions, among other tasks.
The NHS says that there has also been a 69% increase in people downloading the app during the last 12 months to log decisions about donating organs.
Research suggests that 448,000 people registered their wishes between September 2021 and August 2022, which is considerably higher than the 265,000 who did so the year before.
This follows changes to the law in England, Scotland and Wales that presumes adults’ consent to their organs being donated unless they opt out.
Around 6,500 people in the UK are currently waiting for an organ transplant.
People can manage their organ donation status by downloading the app, registering, and then navigating to the ‘Your health’ tab.
Here, users can inform the NHS whether they want to be an organ donor and if they want their loved ones to speak to NHS staff about the process after death.
Only 605 families decided to refuse organ donation during the last 12 months.
Susie Day, the NHS Digital Director of Delivery for the NHS app, said that it was “great” to see more people registering to make such an important decision and encouraged others to do so either online or through the app.
On the success of the NHS app, she added that millions of people are now able to “take control of their healthcare directly”.