St Barts & The NHS

Client

St Barts Health & NHS

Services

Behavioural,Film & Animation,SaaS,User Experience,User Interface,Web

Creating an online learning tool for St Bart’s Health and the NHSE-learning, UX design and digital development for the NHS’s rugby injury prevention initiative

Overview

Barts Health NHS Trust Academic Sciences appointed Brandwork to design and develop an interactive online learning tool to educate referees, coaches and medical staff on the critical dangers of Rugby Union. The project sat at the intersection of healthcare, sport and digital education — and required us to translate complex medical and biomechanical knowledge into an accessible, engaging e-learning experience for a wide-ranging audience across the UK.

The Objective

Acute and chronic neck injuries were becoming increasingly prevalent within rugby, posing serious risks to players at all levels of the game. The NHS needed a way to reach the people best placed to prevent those injuries — referees who manage the game in real time, and medical staff who support clubs week in, week out.

Our brief was to produce a multimedia e-learning package and information portal that could educate these audiences on injury prevention in a way that was compelling, clinically credible and easy to use. The tool needed to work as both a standalone educational resource and an ongoing reference point that users could return to.

E-Learning Platform

We designed and built the Safe Rugby e-learning platform as a fully responsive website and companion app. Users could register as members, work through structured online safety courses and examinations, receive targeted guidance relevant to their role, and bookmark resources for further reading and reference.

The course content was carefully structured to suit audiences who were knowledgeable about rugby but not necessarily clinical specialists. We balanced medical accuracy with plain, direct language, making it straightforward for a referee or club physio to understand the risks they were managing and the preventative steps within their control.

These revelations changed the focus and functionality of the website. We built a consultant finder based on a visual map, filtering by specialism, geography and experience. Solicitors are now able to shortlist, download CV’s and record their searches.We also reviewed the consultant’s CV, bringing to life their experience and expertise. At the same time, eye witness expert profiles emphasised past successes and efficiencies.

The Portal

The portal brought the subject matter to life through a rich media experience. We worked with key rugby ambassadors to produce filmed content, sitting alongside real match footage of scrums, tackles and open play — each piece of footage contextualised to highlight specific risks and the moments where injury is most likely to occur.

The combination of expert voice, real-world footage and structured learning content gave the platform genuine authority. Users weren’t just reading about injury prevention — they were seeing it demonstrated and explained by people they respected within the sport.

The Outcome

The Safe Rugby platform gave Barts Health NHS Trust a credible, scalable tool for reaching rugby’s frontline community across the UK. By meeting referees and medical staff in a digital environment designed around their needs, the project helped shift injury awareness from the clinical setting into the game itself where prevention actually happens.