Content Guru and Simply Connect Awarded a Place on the NHS England Health Systems Support Framework for Social Prescribing

Leader in cloud communications solutions, Content Guru, and its partner Simply Connect, the digital social prescribing platform, have together been awarded a place on the 2021 NHS England Health Systems Support Framework (HSSF) for social prescribing.1

Social prescribing is when health professionals refer patients to support in the community, in order to improve health and wellbeing. This recognizes the fact that many conditions are best treated in non-medical ways, such as by referral to a supported sports or activity organization. Social prescribing is becoming especially important as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, which has left large numbers of people experiencing problems including social isolation and financial anxiety, which often cause them to reach out to the National Health Service (NHS) for help.

HSSF provides a quick and easy way for NHS England organizations to procure services from approved suppliers whose solutions enable digital and service transformation. In particular, the framework focuses on services that support an integrated model of care, delivering a patient-focused, intelligence-led health and care management system.

Content Guru and Simply Connect have been awarded places on the new HSSF social prescribing lot, which itself forms part of NHS England’s national strategy to move to an integrated care model.

Content Guru is working with Simply Connect to help General Practitioners implement social prescribing through a combination of Content Guru’s storm® cloud communications services and Simply Connect’s digital social prescribing platform. The joint solution allows GPs, health professionals, and support agencies to quickly refer people to a social prescribing link worker, or directly into verified community services. The solution enables personalized social prescriptions, detailed case management and wellbeing monitoring, outcomes reporting and a public-facing online portal for self-referrals.

Martin Taylor, Deputy CEO and Co-Founder at Content Guru, commented:

“As an established HSSF framework supplier, we look forward to expanding into the emerging field of social prescribing, which is an important part of providing holistic care. Together with our platform delivery partners at Simply Connect, we are excited to support the development of services that support ultra-personalized health and care. I hope that increasing numbers of NHS organizations who already use Content Guru’s storm communications services will take advantage of this new opportunity to add social prescribing to their portfolios, quickly and easily.”

Sirinda Bhandal, CEO and Founder of Simply Connect, added: “Being awarded a place on HSSF is testament to our commitment to developing a best-in-class digital platform aimed at enabling the NHS to achieve its goal of at least 900,000 people referred to social prescribing by 2023/24.2 We know the NHS is under immense pressure and the pandemic is taking a real toll on our mental and physical health. By offering a personalized care approach to complement existing interventions, we help to reduce reliance on statutory services, by supporting people to live healthier, happier lives.

“Working with Content Guru will enable us to expand our relationships with healthcare providers, as they already have strong foothold and much experience in the sector. Looking forward, we’re committed to working towards our vision of supporting access to personalized care through a social prescription and helping create healthier, happier lives for everyone.”

1 https://www.england.nhs.uk/hssf/supplier-lists/#patient-empowerment-and-activation

2 https://www.england.nhs.uk/personalisedcare/social-prescribing/