Benefits of Increasing PKB Registrations
Hospitals can use several strategies to encourage patients to register for their Patients Know Best (PKB) record. Increasing patient registration improves efficiency, reduces costs, and enhances care. For customers in England, enabling the NHS App is the most effective way to increase registration rates.
Why Increasing Registrations
Boosting patient registrations for PKB delivers significant benefits across clinical, operational, and environmental areas.
Lower costs and improved efficiency
By moving to digital correspondence, organisations can drastically reduce:
Postage and printing costs
Paper usage
Administrative workload
This shift streamlines internal processes and enables faster, more efficient communication with patients.
Greater patient engagement
Registered patients have secure access to their health information, giving them more control over their care. Increased engagement leads to better-informed patients, higher satisfaction, and improved health outcomes.
Improvements operations
Higher PKB registration rates can:
Reduce missed appointments (DNAs) by up to 34%
Enable real-time updates
Support smoother communication between clinical teams and patients
Enhanced care coordination
PKB bring all of a patient's data into one accessible place, improving the management of:
Chronic and long term conditions
Perioperative pathways
Shared care across primary and secondary settings
Supports coordinated and proactive care planning
Drive NHSE digital initiatives
Increased patient registrations amplify the impact of key NHS England programs by ensuring patients are digitally connected with their data and teams, including:
Waiting list validation
Pre-operative assessments
Patient Initiated Follow-Up (PIFU)
Support NHS sustainability goals
Registering patients with PKB contributes to NHSE’s ambition of becoming net zero by 2045.
As of the end of 2023, PKB has helped avoid the need to physically send over 2.5 million letters, preventing 342 tonnes of CO₂e from entering the atmosphere.
What to do
Increase patient registrations for PKB, targeting substantial monthly growth. This is an achievable goal, ensuring that more patients are actively engaged with their health records, unlocking the benefits of digital correspondence and streamlining hospital communications.
Focus on patients with upcoming appointments or data in their records, prioritising engaging with patients coming into the hospital for appointments, treatment, and surgery.
Reduces costs, improves operational efficiency, and strengthens patient and hospital communication.
How to Increase Registrations
In England, switching on the NHS App is the most effective way to increase registration rates.
To streamline the process in and outside of England, follow these steps:
Identify Unregistered Patients: Collate data on unregistered patients with recorded email addresses, upcoming appointments, or other relevant information in Patients Know Best (PKB).
Request CSV Files: Ask the PKB Support team to regularly generate pre-formatted CSV files containing NHS numbers and email addresses. Ensure that any flagged patients are removed as necessary.
Automate Invitations: Upload the CSV to PKB to automate the outreach. PKB will handle sending the email invitations and subsequent reminders.
To measure success, review the current registration rates and analyse trends. Your Success PM can assist you with this process. Establish a target percentage increase within a specific timeframe, and your Success PM will track and provide the organisation with a report on registration statistics.
Methods to Increase Registrations
Below is a list of practical strategies proven to boost registration rates. As many PKB customers know, trying a combination of methods ensures sustained growth; don’t limit yourself to just one approach at a time.
Setting goals and planning
Establish a hospital-wide registration target and review progress upon reaching it.
Define a time frame.
Decide how many methods to try and when to implement each one.
Determine the number of active patients using the hospital to guide your approach.
Staff engagement and integration
Train staff to explain PKB and its benefits during patient interactions.
Encourage healthcare teams (doctors, nurses, care coordinators) to recommend PKB during conversations.
Incorporate PKB into processes:
Add PKB registration as a step on discharge checklists.
Include as part of the admission.
Patient-focused events and champions
Workshops and webinars: Host events where patients learn how PKB benefits their care and what data they’ll access.
PKB champions: Identify patient ambassadors who can share their positive experiences and encourage others to register.
Direct patient invitations
Email invitations: Send clear, easy-to-follow registration instructions
SMS notifications: With registration links, repeat for patients with appointments or data.
Register links are added to every correspondence/letter, a full list is here.
In-clinic registration: Encourage registration during visits with staff or volunteers. Use QR codes, videos in waiting rooms.
Hospital website: Links prominently on home pages.
Communications and marketing
Correspondence: Registration links in all hospital correspondence.
Social media: Promote PKB registration on the hospital’s social media channels and website.
Provide brochures, posters, flyers in waiting and discharge areas.
Include QR codes
Social media campaigns
Use cases and case studies
Pre-communication campaigns: Local radio stations to raise awareness.
Patient education materials: Brochures, posters, and flyers.
Use Cases
In one month, strategic registration drives at Kent and Medway Mental Health (KMMH) showed how targeted workflows and mass communication can quickly increase patient enrollment and digital engagement on the PKB platform.
Kent and Medway Mental Health (KMMH)
Celebrating its one-month anniversary, KMMH has achieved a 48% registration rate, smashing its initial target by 8%. Alongside this rapid onboarding, all appointments are available in PKB and the NHS App with notifications and messaging (N&M) turned on. Within the first month of the Trust wide go live, they sent just over 63,000 appointments to 20,700 patients.
Their Mental Health Together team also saw a staggering 300% increase in Patient Reported Experience Measure (PREM) completions in just 4 weeks.
How they did it
Appointments are sent directly to PKB and the NHS App Wayfinder via N&M, allowing patients to view their appointments and register with PKB if an email is attached to their record.
Implemented a workflow where unregistered patients are invited to register and view their appointment in PKB and/or to complete questionnaires by verifying their identity using only their date of birth
Once the questionnaire is submitted, the patients are immediately prompted to register for PKB, capturing them at high engagement.
Supported by a trust-wide go-live across 22 clinical teams, utilising a resource library and digital care plans.
Barts Health NHS Trust
200,000 patients registered within the first year and the trust has worked on an automated SMS registration workflow.
The Trust is currently live with a range of functionality including appointments, digital letters, consent care plans and test results - all conveniently accessible to patients through the NHS App. To read more, click here.
How did they achieve 200,000 registrations in one year
Great comms locally
PKB QR codes on posters and digital screens across the trust.
Asked PKB for all the email addresses attached to records that were not registered. They emailed them a registration link and explained the benefits of registering with PKB.
Imperial College Health NHS Trust
In 2024, Imperial celebrated registering 500,000 patients on PKB and released over 270 million test results. They now have over 700,000 registered patients.
How to replicate
Imperial used an efficient ADT SMS registration workflow.
Used PKB’s APIs to streamline patient registrations by checking the registration status
Over 18 receive an SMS to register if they activity in the trust.
Under-18s receive an SMS every 6 months, typically sent to the carer/parent who receives the SMS invite.
Implements patient engagement comms
Developed posters and videos displayed in the clinic waiting area.
Leaflets with QR codes for easy access to registration and further information on what data they will receive.
Prove Registration Methods
NHS App Integrations
The primary and most seamless method for patient access is through the NHS App. This integration allows patients to access their PKB record using their existing NHS Login credentials. Because authentication is handled by the NHS, it reduces the trust's administrative burden and provides a familiar interface for patients.
Digital Communications (SMS and Email)
Digital notifications are highly effective for reaching large cohorts of patients quickly.
SMS Notifications: You can trigger text messages at various stages of the patient journey, such as upon record creation, during an appointment referral, or as a mass notification. While services like http://GOV.UK Notify offer free initial tiers, long-term costs should be considered based on volume.
Email Invites: These can be sent via automated HL7 feeds from your PAS or through bulk CSV uploads. This is generally a cost-neutral method and is highly recommended for pre-registration campaigns before a service goes live.
Physical and Face-to-Face Methods
Traditional methods remain essential for digital inclusion and reaching patients who may not interact with digital notifications immediately.
Appointment Letters: Including a QR code or a registration link on paper correspondence is a low-cost way to encourage sign-ups. If you use a hybrid mail provider like Synertec, Funasset, Xerox or HCC, there may be small configuration fees, but these are often offset by reduced future paper costs.
Clinical Points of Contact: Staff at reception desks or within clinics can initiate registration during face-to-face consultations. This personal touch often leads to higher trust and better long-term usage of PKB.
Communication and Self-Registration
A robust communications plan is vital for a successful rollout. This includes using the trust website, staff intranet, social media, and waiting room screens to direct patients to self-registration URLs.
Standard Registration: The recommended patient-friendly page is the general PKB register link.
NHS Login Direct: You can provide links that take patients directly to the NHS Login interface to immediately link their accounts.
Organisation or Team Specific: Customised URLs can be used to ensure patients are automatically assigned to the correct organisation and clinical or administrative team.
Implementation Considerations
When selecting your methods, consider the following:
Most digital methods are free or low-cost, whereas physical mail and supplier database reconfigurations may incur charges.
Determine if your local IT team can amend letter templates or if you require external supplier support.
Identify the most logical touchpoints in your specific pathway where a patient is likely to engage with their health record.
SMS Registration Links
There are four primary ways to register patients via SMS. Please select the link that best fits your specific workflow.
1. General Registration (Recommended)
Link: https://patientsknowbest.com/register/ Best for: General invitations and mass notifications. Why: This is the most patient-friendly starting point. It clearly explains the registration process and offers the patient a choice of how to sign up, making it the most versatile option for SMS.
2. Direct NHS Login
Link: https://my.patientsknowbest.com/nhs-login/login Best for: Patients who already use the NHS App. Why: This bypasses the PKB welcome screens and takes the patient straight to the NHS Login portal. Note: Your organisation must manually add the patient to the correct clinical team for them to see their data.
3. Customised Organisation Login
Link: 
4. Automated Team Assignment via NHS Login
Link: https://my.patientsknowbest.com/nhs-login/login?pkbNhsLogin=true&teamCode=ORGTEAMCODE Best for: Self-referral pathways or "waiting room" registrations. Why: This is a powerful link that both authenticates the patient via NHS Login and automatically adds them to your specific team in one journey. This is ideal for workflows where the patient is not yet in your PKB system. (Please obtain your ORGTEAMCODE from your PKB Success PM).