DHSC’s Get Adult Social Care Data Alpha Assessment Insights

The ‘Get Adult Social Care Data‘ service, developed by the Data Access Project (DAP), is an alpha-stage digital solution designed to address significant data gaps within the Adult Social Care (ASC) sector. Its primary objective is to enable more evidence-based decision-making by consolidating and combining data from various sources. This platform aims to remove information barriers, enhance transparency, and facilitate tracking progress against the Health Mission for social care and National Care Service Standards, fostering a data-driven culture across organisations. Primary users include Local Authorities, Care Providers, DHSC analysts, policy leaders, and Academic Researchers, while secondary users extend to NHS England, ICBs, CQC, and other government departments.

During its Alpha assessment, the service demonstrated strong user-centricity, successfully engaging 80 users through diverse research methods, including co-creation sessions and interviews. The team effectively used a hypothesis-led approach, even trialling AI with a large language model to provide simple data summaries, and iterated prototypes frequently. Significant progress was noted in understanding the problem space, defining scope, and planning for a secure service compliant with GDPR, aiming for minimal personal data collection and robust infrastructure security. The commitment to WCAG 2.2 accessibility standards was also acknowledged, with plans for dedicated testing in Beta.

However, the assessment highlighted crucial areas for development. The team needs to refine core user needs articulation, ensure continued co-creation with users having diverse needs (e.g., English as a second language, accessibility), and map comprehensive service pathways for communication in Private Beta. A key challenge is the lack of accessibility testing during Alpha, which must be prioritised early in Beta to avoid embedded design issues. Further work is required on simplifying the data dashboard, improving navigation, implementing a robust GOV.UK-integrated secure login with MFA, and establishing scalable, cost-effective hosting and continuous deployment strategies. Opening source code to public repositories and fostering cross-government collaboration were also identified as vital next steps.

(Source: https://digitalhealth.blog.gov.uk/2026/03/06/dhsc-get-adult-social-care-data-alpha-assessment/)