Yorkshire & Humber Academic Health Science Network (AHSN) is 1 of 15 AHSNs set up by NHS England.
Across the country AHSNs act as a bridge between health care providers, commissioners, academia and industry. The goal of an AHSN is to ‘improve the health and prosperity of their region by unlocking the potential of new ideas’.
Yorkshire & Humber AHSN brings together academia, the NHS and private businesses to develop new solutions. With these, they aim to improve service delivery, while contributing to boosting the local economy. They develop projects, programmes and initiatives that reflect the diversity of their local populations and healthcare challenges.
One of their initiatives is West Yorkshire and Harrogate Healthy Hearts. With this initiative, they aim to reduce the impact of cardiovascular disease. And help prevent heart-related illnesses, including heart attacks and strokes across the whole region.
In line with their goals, they developed the West Yorkshire and Harrogate Healthy Hearts website. It’s been designed to help patients gain a better understanding of the risk of cardiovascular disease. And provide advice to help them prevent/manage the risk factors that can cause a heart attack or stroke. With a diverse audience, it’s vital that this website is accessible to everyone. Including those who are deaf, blind or have other disabilities that might make it difficult to access digital information.
Yorkshire & Humber AHSN wanted to offer support to their online visitors. They chose to add the ReachDeck Toolbar to their website, an assistive technology toolbar.
The ReachDeck Toolbar adds speech, reading and translation support to any website. With its features, users can have text read out loud. They can make text bigger, or simplify a webpage. They can translate into over 100 languages - and much more.
With ReachDeck, Yorkshire & Humber AHSN hope to “support people who might otherwise find it difficult to access information online.”
Speaking of the software, and their experience with ReachDeck, Sara Novara, Communications and Engagement Manager stated;
The team at Texthelp made it really easy to install the products. The ReachDeck Toolbar includes all the functionalities we were looking for and it is really easy and intuitive to use.
Breaks down communication barriers. Improve the accessibility, readability and reach of your online content.