In January 2025, the Universal Care Plan (UCP) underwent a significant evolution. The care plan was transformed into a personalised care and support plan, with patient preferences and wishes at the fore.
Last reviewed: 13 March 2025
Key Messages
Launched in January 2025
On Tuesday 21st January, the UCP platform was updated to support personalised care planning.
Rest assured, the UCP remains a tool for advance care planning
Enabling existing patients and professionals to record and view important information relating to urgent and end of life care is of paramount importance. No data fields in the UCP were removed, with the exception of Medications and Allergies which will pre-populate from the GP system in the future*. Some of the data fields were regrouped; however from our User Feedback Phase, we found that the users thought the new design was more intuitive to find what they were looking for. The Urgent Care Summary has remained in place and none of the data fields have been removed.
Users asked us for a flexible, digital care plan
When the UCP was procured in 2021, we engaged with hundreds of users who were already involved in creating urgent and end-of-life care plans. Users informed us that they wanted a care plan that could be used in collaboration with patients who may have other health needs, such as long-term conditions, and may not necessarily be receiving end-of-life care or palliative care. After the UCP was developed as an urgent and end-of-life plan, we set out to understand which clinical groups wanted to use the UCP and how it would fit into their pathways.
*Medications and Allergies data will be pulled from the GP record
During our User Feedback Phase, users told us that they did not rely on the Medications and Allergies information in the UCP. This is because the section has to be manually updated by a user and become out of date as a patient’s medication changes. The majority of users informed us that they use another source of information with real time data, such as the London Care Record or National Care Records Service. We are currently developing an integration with GP Connect, which display medications and allergies data directly from the GP record, meaning that it is always up to date. Until this is developed, users should consult another data source.
New forms and data fields provide a richer picture of the person receiving care
The new template has been expanded to include ‘global information’ which relates to the person regardless of their health condition. This includes:
- What matters to them – Incorporates the PRSB’s ‘About Me’ standard; daily life and interests, likes and dislikes, goals, concerns and general wellbeing.
- Communication and accessibility requirements – how the person communicates, how to help them communicate e.g. technology or methods, information formats; supportive adjustments to help them access healthcare e.g. help with phobias, adaptations to appointments or their healthcare environment.
- Additional personal information – including gender identity and preferred pronouns, information about their school
- Living arrangements – additional information about their living situation to support discharge planning.
- Daily activities and support needs – Frailty score, activities where support is required: domestic, personal care, managing finances, managing medication, mobility needs, equipment; falls risk; driving, and keeping safe in the community.
- Symptom management plan – Allows the user to input tiers of management (crisis, day to day and prevention).
- Medical devices – Information about managing catheters, stomas, feeding equipment, respiratory devices, cardiac, intravenous access.
The expanded UCP can be viewed on our Training Environment
The Training Environment has been updated with the new care plan template so users can familiarise themselves with it. Please complete this form to receive access. Our team will set up your account and you will receive a link to activate your account and create your password. Once complete, you can log in here.
Training and communication resources are available
To support the expansion of the UCP we have undertaken a review of our training materials to ensure they are up to date. The learn page of our website has been refreshed with updated and new resources. The resources have been separated into 3 sections: ‘Got 5 minutes?’, ‘Time for lunch?’ and ‘Protected learning’ to provide just enough information, just when you need it.