Helping digital mental health innovation work in the real world

Health Innovation Kent Surrey Sussex (KSS) is supporting the Mental Health Digital Innovation workstream of the UK Mental Health Goals Programme. 

MHDI is a new national initiative launched through the UK Government’s Mental Health Goals Programme to accelerate the development, adoption and use of digital technologies that improve mental health outcomes across the UK.​

Health Innovation KSS are developing local skills and expertise, and practical tools to help build sustainable adoption of digital tools and technologies for healthcare services.

Read this blog by Jenny Brooks, Translational Research Assistant at Health Innovation Kent Surrey Sussex to find out more.

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Why implementation matters 

Digital tools can improve mental health by widening access, supporting earlier help and diagnosis and giving people more choice in treatment.

But these technologies often do not achieve their full potential. Many healthcare services, including NHS Mental Health Trusts struggle to move innovations beyond pilots or initial implementation because of challenges such as pathway fit, information governance, clinical safety, staff confidence, evidence, procurement and long-term sustainable funding. 

Ayesha Rahim, CCIO at Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, and a member of our programme delivery board shares the importance of the Mental Health Digital Innovation workstream within the Mental Health Goals Programme in enabling sustainable adoption of digital innovations:

“The NHS is awash with case studies, and yet we still see the same challenges over again when trying to embed or spread and scale the innovation. The Mental Health Goals Programme is a real chance to do much of the heavy lifting by identifying those critical success factors and helping providers to start with the end in mind.”

Ayesha Rahim, CCIO at Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Foundation trust

Our role in the Mental Health Digital Innovation Workstream

Health Innovation Kent Surrey Sussex are leading work to support the practical implementation of digital innovation in NHS mental health trusts by helping to create the conditions needed for digital mental health innovations to be implemented, scaled and sustained across healthcare services. This supports the NHS's shift from analogue to digital, set out in the 10-Year Health Plan.

Learning from mental health services 

Our role is to focus on what happens when digital innovation meets frontline services. We are working with NHS Mental Health Trusts across Kent, Surrey and Sussex and beyond to understand what helps implementation to happen, what gets in the way and what support Mental Health Trusts need. 

This work is applied and practical. We are looking at how digital tools and technologies can be embedded safely, fairly and sustainably in busy services, not just whether they work in theory.

Our work aims to increase local confidence and knowledge. We will produce practical case studies and implementation guidance for Mental Health Trusts, sharing what works well, what was difficult and what others can apply in their own context.

Early lessons

Through our delivery group and local Trust partnerships, we are exploring live implementation projects. We are helping teams to understand their starting point, track progress and identify barriers, including culture, leadership, clinical safety, data, governance, pathway integration and meaningful involvement of people with lived experience.

Early learning shows that the biggest challenges often appear later on in the process, when teams are trying to launch, embed and sustain digital tools and technologies. Problems at these later stages are often shaped by earlier decisions, such as whether the right problem was identified, whether staff and service users were involved early, and whether the innovation fits the pathway.

Digital innovation will not transform mental health care on its own. It needs strong partnerships, trusted evidence, inclusive design and practical implementation support. Health Innovation KSS is proud to lead this work, helping services embed digital innovation to enable lasting improvements for people and communities.

For more information about Health Innovation Kent Surrey Sussex, click here.

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About Health Innovation Kent Surrey Sussex

Health Innovation Kent Surrey Sussex (KSS) is the health innovation network for the Kent and Medway, Surrey and Sussex regions. There are 15 health innovation networks across England, established by NHS England in 2013. Health Innovation KSS supports health and social care teams to find, test, implement and scale evidence-based solutions to the NHS’s greatest challenges, driving economic growth for the region, supporting innovators and improving the lives of local people.

About the Mental Health Digital Innovation (MHDI) Workstream

MHDI is the digital workstream of the UK Government's Mental Health Goals (MHG) Programme. MHDI brings together the NHS, academia, industry, technology providers and people with lived experience to accelerate the adoption of evidence-based digital mental health technologies across the NHS. Through partnerships, implementation expertise and workforce innovation, MHDI is developing the infrastructure and implementation approaches needed to translate digital innovation into routine mental healthcare.

Find out more about the Mental Health Digital Innovation workstream here.

The Mental Health Goals Programme: Building a national alliance for mental health innovation 

The UK Mental Health Goals Programme aims to create an innovative alliance between people with mental health conditions and industry to accelerate the development of new and more effective approaches to mental health treatment and care.

Find out more about the Mental Health Goals Programme here.