Everything you need to know about GP Online

Patients can quickly and easily navigate to prominent appointment management content and, linking with many common practice management and online consultation tools (e.g., Klinik), take appropriate action. Including booking, amending and cancelling appointment, in addition to facilitating online consultations, GP Online reduces the need for both calls to reception and in-person consultation.

Patients can quickly and easily navigate to prominent prescription-focused content and, linking with many common prescription management tools (e.g., Patient Access), take informed action, reducing the need for in-person repeat prescriptions.

GP Online reduces the need for GPs to create and manage onsite symptom or triage-related content, by signposting patients directly to the NHS A-Z or NHS App.

Patients can provide direct feedback via GP Online as well as register interest to join a local patient participation group. Both feedback forms are included as out-of-the-box templates, alongside the ability to create new, bespoke forms.

Content guiding patients on how to provide constructive feedback or submit complaints makes the process simple and straightforward.

To maintain simplicity of setup, GP Online does not directly integrate with any practice management, online consultation or prescription management tools. Instead, a link direct to your tool of choice is incorporated, alongside some contextual content managing patient expectations that they are about to leave the surgery website and enter a new tool. This ensures that almost all tools can be easily linked to GP Online.

Common linked tools include, but are not limited to; Klinik, eConsult, Patient Access, Accurx, TPP, AskMyGP, and more. Please contact us if you have any concerns about the suitability of your existing tools for use with GP Online.

Carefully designed user journeys and the related navigation ensure that patients have clear visibility and access to the options available to them. Including key actions such as appointment management, repeat prescriptions or practice registration, GP Online also allows practices to promote local social prescribing options. Links to NHS A-Z and NHS App further promotes self-serve behaviours.

GP Online complies with all recognised data privacy guidelines, including GDPR and NHS regulations. No personally identifiable data (such as patient data) is stored within the solution, a cookie management tool is configured on launch, and all relevant cookie and privacy policies are provided within the supplied exemplar content.

GP Online adheres to W3 WCAG 2.2 AA guidelines, the most up-to-date recognised accessibility standards at the point of launch. Accessibility is inherent to the design, development and content of GP Online but also requires continued adherence by website editors post-launch to ensure continued compliance.

As the majority of local GP patients access their surgery website on mobile devices, GP Online is designed ‘mobile-first’, meaning that all pages and content are considered and designed from the perspective of mobile users first and foremost. The solution automatically adapts its layout depending on the screen size and uses common visual language to help the user navigate easily.

Yes. There is scope to include your PCN or practice logo and imagery of your location within GP Online. However, given the familiarity and trust patients have with NHS branding, the website will be primarily presented using the NHS visual framework, including colours, fonts and graphic elements.

Although GP Online comes pre-populated with a baseline of NHS-approved and accessible content, all pages are editable, meaning that you can amend the supplied content and create brand new pages, as required. During onboarding one of our GP website experts will guide you through the content production process and support the creation of new, bespoke content for your practice or PCN.

Yes. This area is fully editable, and featured news stories can also be promoted elsewhere on the website (e.g. home page, if required). Visit the example GP website, to see the news module in action.

Yes. Standard opening hours are displayed on the Contact page but can also be placed elsewhere on the site if required. An emergency notification feature can also be used in unusual circumstances (such as public holidays) to ensure visibility with patients.

Yes. Every GP Online website has a dedicated section for staff profiles. This includes a filterable (by role) overview page and a subsequent individual detail page for each team member.

Yes. A number of options are available to editors to ensure visibility of promotions or seasonal advice. New pages can be created and added to the ‘Patient Care Support’ area of the website. Alternatively, you could use the emergency messaging banner or home page signposting to highlight new content to patients.

Yes. GP Online includes a series of pre-configured forms, such as complaints and feedback, Patient Participation Group and Friends and Family Test, in addition to the ability to create and add your own forms.

Both the NHS App and NHS A-Z are visually and navigationally prominent within GP Online, further reinforcing the link between the practice or PCN and the familiarity and trust of the NHS brand. Additionally, a CQC widget is included in the footer to ensure live visibility of the practice performance and a link to the listing on the CQC website.

Yes. A translation tool, powered by Google Translate, is integrated into the navigation. This automatically translates all on-page content into the selected language and also includes unique characters and right-to-left languages.

Yes. GP Online is incredibly effective on search engines. Not only is the site speed and page load times super-fast (a real bonus for the Google algorithms), but the additional configuration work implemented during onboarding of each site combined with the population of the exemplar content, makes GP Online highly visible in search.

Onboarding to GP Online couldn’t be easier. Initially consulting with you to understand your objectives and current status, our GP website experts then take the hassle away from you. We edit and populate your content, configure your analytics, prepare the site for search, and liaise with your existing supplier to transfer your URL.

Absolutely. Our GP website experts will meet with you at the start of onboarding to understand what content you would like to keep, and what you would like to replace.

As there are no complex integrations, GP Online will work alongside most practice management systems. These include, but are not limited to; EMIS, SystmOne, ProGP and Curoflow. Please contact us if you have any questions.

Yes. There are a number of available options in terms of how GP Online can be configured to work with PCNs or practice groups.

These include:

• A dedicated PCN website with separate, individual practice websites
• A combined PCN/practice website, incorporating information for each site within the group within a single website. This approach can also work with sub-groups (e.g. collating 2-3 practices together into a region).
• Separate, individual practice websites, each with a page of content relating to the PCN or group, but with no dedicated PCN website

All PCN or group website managers will be able to access and manage all sites within the group, with restrictions applied at individual practice levels, if required.

Your new GP Online website will have Google Analytics GA4 installed and properly configured as part of the onboarding process.

However, you don’t have to become a Google expert in order to understand how your website is working, as a reporting dashboard will be created containing all your key performance data in one place. Hands-on training and related materials will also be provided to help you get the most out of your dashboard.

Yes. However, we strongly recommend that your practice acquires an NHS domain, as this helps to build recognition and trust with your patients. If an NHS domain is adopted, our GP website experts will ensure that the current domain is redirected, ensuring consistency for existing patients and maintaining SEO performance.

GP Online’s GP website experts take as much of the hassle away from you as possible. An initial consultation will assess your current status, and help to agree objectives, content requirements, and intended launch date and timeline.

Beyond the initial consultation, you will also need to share appropriate resources (e.g. team photos), share your existing supplier information, approve your content once populated, approve Google configuration emails, and liaise with NHS to obtain an NHS domain, if required.

Most launches take between 2-4 weeks from start to finish, and we can adapt the timeline depending on your availability.

Hands-on training with one of our GP website experts is provided virtually before launch, and a range of written and video training content will be shared for future reference. You can invite as many colleagues to attend the training as appropriate.

Regular, free post-launch drop-in sessions with our Support team can serve as a refresher, while your Support drawdown time can also be used for training purposes.

As GP Online is currently in a pre-commercial launch phase, it is not yet available for direct purchase. However, if you are interested in onboarding or simply learning more, please register your interest to benefit from launch day pricing.

However, if your surgery or PCN is based in South West England, then you may be eligible to have GP Online onboarding and year 1 costs funded by your NHS region. Refer to our ‘Funding’ page for more details.

If your GP surgery or PCN is based in the South West of England, you may be eligible to join the NHS region’s ‘Phase 1’, where onboarding and year 1 costs are funded, pending certain criteria and conditions being met. Please visit our ‘Funding’ page for more details.

Even if you are still in contract with your current supplier, we’d still like to hear from you. Depending on your remaining term, you may still be eligible for funding if based on the South West, while for practices outside of the region, our GP website experts will be happy to talk you through the options available. Get in touch to express your interest in GP Online.

Unlike many suppliers, we have a dedicated Support Team, whose sole responsibility is to ensure you maximise your post-launch experience with GP Online. Both our Standard and Advanced Support options offer excellent value and include secure hosting, security patching and minor version updates, access to our online Support desk, opportunity to contribute to product improvement, regular free drop-in refresher sessions, and a comprehensive suite of training materials.

Both options also include call-off content editing and production (either 3 or 8 hours a year, depending on package), and further ‘top-up’ support can also be purchased.

The addition of new features and functionality is managed centrally. We encourage all of our GPs and PCNs to make suggestions for improvements which, if approved, are then rolled out to ALL websites. This ensures that GP Online continues to adapt and evolve to meet the needs of a fast-moving sector.

All requests are assigned a priority level upon triage, from critical issues (such as site downtime) warranting a response within 1 hour and resolution within 2 hours, to standard support requests receiving a response within 8 hours and resolution within 5 working days.

Note, that our standard business hours are 9:00-5:00 Monday to Friday. Please refer to our ‘Terms and Conditions’ for full details of our service levels.

GP Online is fully content managed, meaning that surgery staff, following training, will be able to easily edit existing pages and create new pages, as required, without developer support.

Access to the underlying code is restricted. However, we do not anticipate any instance where surgery staff should require access, and our Support Team are on hand to address any technical questions you might have.

As security patches or minor versions of the underlying content management system (CMS) are released we implement them swiftly, following an initial impact test, applying them to all GP Online website centrally.

Major CMS version updates are investigated thoroughly before determining the appropriate course of action. You will be notified of any major updates that we plan to implement, along with their timing and any related short-term impact to site visibility or usability.

GP Online does not process patient data. All personally identifiable information and patient data are managed externally by the practice management system or online consultation tools used by the practice or PCN.

A continuous improvement group meets regularly to discuss improvements and ideas for GP Online. The group will prioritise ideas based on a combination of impact and value across the whole network of GP Online customers, with other ideas placed in a backlog for future implementation.

You can make suggestions for new functionality directly to your Support Team contact, either via telephone, email or at one of the regular drop-in sessions.

GP Online was developed by leading digital agency, Spindogs, in conjunction with NHS South West Digital Transformation team. All GP Online websites are managed by Spindogs’ dedicated Support Team. Post-Pilot/Phase 1 websites will be invoiced directly by Spindogs.

Read our NHS South West Pilot programme case study to learn more about how Spindogs worked with GPs and patient participation groups to develop the GP Online website solution.