Weeknotes Monday 26 May - Sunday 01 Jun 2025
S06E01
Gently easing myself into writing weeknotes again.
Things I did
Monday
It being a bank holiday I found myself with some free time and surprising motivation to attempt a revival of this website, so I:
- Updated Eleventy to version 3.
- Fixed subsequent bugs, reconnected the CMS I configured previously
- Updated some of the content.
Tuesday
Back to work with NHS 111 online where we recently started tentatively exploring allowing children under the age of 5 (or parents/guardians there of) to use the service.
Currently this is not possible, users are instead directed to the 111 telephony service to speak to trained call handers and clincians.
There is a lot of nuance and complexity to unpick. We have questions like:
- How might we reorganise demographic capture, e. g. is it important to have a child’s date of birth at the outset?
- How might we handle checks for high-acuity symptoms?
So I booked some time with Gail, content designer and 111 online veteran who knows a heck of a lot more than I do about triage questions and how they are written in Pathways.
Wednesday
Day off to look after the little ones. We took them to mini golf which was much like trying to herd a bunch of cats who were high on fizzy drinks and armed to the teeth with metal sticks.
Thursday
I started the day by joining a call with a potential supplier, they were demonstrating a new suit of tools. No points for guessing they made use of AI.
Next I remotely joined a day-long User Centred Design event for members of Digital Urgent and Emergency Care portfolio. Alex gave a good overview of AI and his experiences of using it. He spoke well, he talked about Large Language Models and the impact they are having on all of our work as designers.
Friday
Made it to the end of the week but I’ve had little opportunity to do any hands-on delivery work.
An IT issue scuppers a chunk of the morning. I help Debbie (Head of Product for 111) to review a submission we’re making to the National Clinical Advisory Group (NCAG) about our Under 5’s work.
Mericfully I did manage to carve out time to work on a 111 specific fork of the NHS Prototype Kit.
Links I clicked
- What does a Product Manager actually do? - An attempt to map the various things a Product Manager does.
- Fix the Foundations - Particularly liked a lot of the suggestions in the NHS England Re-organisation section.
Videos I watched
- Intelligent Navigation: Reimagining First Contact in Healthcare - Exploring how AI can help people access the right healthcare services more efficiently
- Homeless Mustard “Creep” GREATEST Cover EVER