‘Florence’, or ‘Flo’ as it is referred to, combines the expertise of healthcare professionals with the convenience of the patients' own mobile phone. Florence sends text reminders to patients, prompting them to check their blood pressure. Once the patient has taken their blood pressure, they can text the readings to Florence. The program will collate all the information provided and can be accessed by the clinician at any stage of the process.

Flo can also send patients advice to act on, or ask the patient health related questions and give health promotion messages. This is all done via the familiar ’SMS’ text messaging system and is completely free of charge to patients.

• Flo gives practitioners the opportunity to monitor patients’ blood pressure remotely, reducing the number of face-to-face appointments required to diagnose, titrate or monitor hypertension.
• Flo gives patients the opportunity to have their blood pressure monitored by the practice without having to attend the surgery, reducing inconvenience and travel cost.
• Flo can remove white-coat syndrome, optimising readings and clinical decision-making.
• Flo allows patients to understand their own condition and make lifestyle changes/seek medical advice as required to allow them to maintain longer, healthier lives. In short it can motivate patients to self-manage.
• Studies show long term hypertension monitoring with Flo encourages medication compliance and therefore reduces the risk of stroke and heart attack.

A nationally produced video to support the Florence programme can be viewed via the following link: Florence Patient Video

The British Heart foundation also provides a 'how to' video to Managing your Blood Pressure at home: Managing Your Blood Pressure At Home

We encourage patients to purchase a home Blood Pressure device for self management of their blood pressure monitoring. Recommendations for a suitable device can be found via the Blood Pressure UK Org website link below. It would be helpful if you decide to purchase a monitor, that you let the surgery know to enable recording of this in your medical notes. Suitable Blood Pressure Monitors

Please take some time to read all of the information on the PDFs below. These are also available in a paper format, please ask the clinician who is leading your Florence care for a copy. Once you have completed the Patient Opt In Form, please email to gram.scotstownadministrator@nhs.scot

Please note that we are only inviting a limited number of patients to use Florence at this time. Please do not fill in the opt in form unless you have been advised to by a clinician. We hope to expand the number of patients who are invited to use the Florence system in due course.

Patient Opt In Form

Florence Patient Leaflet

Text Messaging Information

Florence Privacy Notice

Using Florence to Monitor Your Blood Pressure Guide

Blood Pressure Shared Management Plan

Blood Pressure Shared Management Plan for CKD 3.5 and/or Diabetes