At the peak of the COVID-19 outbreak in the UK, thousands of people were being admitted to hospitals for urgent medical care every day, putting significant demands on the National Health Service (NHS). Under intense pressure, the NHS needed to continue to deliver excellent service while protecting its workers.
Members of staff — including primary, secondary and social care workers, pharmacists and dentists — needed to stay connected when working from remote locations. So NHS Digital and Accenture, supported by key engineering resources from Avanade, set about equipping staff with enhanced communication and collaboration capabilities. Joining forces with Microsoft and NHSX, the team aimed to rapidly implement Microsoft Teams nationwide.
Within seven days the joint team built and tested the Microsoft Teams integration, and the platform was rolled out to all 1.2million NHSmail users across 16,000 NHS organizations. NHS workers are now able to securely send instant messages, complete audio and video calls and host virtual meetings across England.
The platform is already playing a vital role in keeping care teams connected.
