Transforming Clinical Communication: How Hark replaced pagers and got acquired by DeepMind

When Communication Breaks Down, Patient Safety Can Fail

Hospitals rely on communication to function, yet many still depend on outdated tools like pagers. This isn’t just inefficient. It’s unsafe.

Clinical errors from poor communication contribute directly to misdiagnoses, medication mistakes, and even preventable deaths.

Junior doctors, especially on night shifts, are left coordinating patient care across wards with no shared task list, no way to escalate urgency, and no system-wide visibility.

In busy hospital environments, this isn’t just frustrating. It’s dangerous.

Without better communication tools:

A Vision for Safer, Smarter Care

We knew that replacing pagers wasn’t enough.

What hospitals needed was a platform designed for how care actually works, in real time, across teams, and under pressure.

The aim was to give frontline teams speed and clarity and give hospitals oversight they’d never had before.

That foundation became Hark. A new kind of clinical task management platform. Designed with doctors, tested on the ward, and trusted in the moments that matter most.

A smarter system for Hospital Task Management

Hark was built to replace outdated, disconnected pager systems with a modern, clinically safe task management platform.

It gave doctors and hospital teams the tools to:

• Escalate urgent tasks to a shared, real-time list
• Delegate work to available colleagues based on workload
• Prioritise tasks by clinical urgency, not message order
• Securely share patient data and update task status
• Integrate with hospital systems to provide critical context at the point of care

Hark was more than a messaging app. It became the clinical coordination layer sitting across departments, giving teams the visibility and structure to respond faster and more effectively.

Operational dashboards added another layer helping clinical leads monitor task flow, spot delays, and reallocate resources in real time.

The result was a platform that brought clarity, accountability, and confidence to care teams working under constant pressure.

How we delivered Hark

Discover

Hark began with a simple question: How can we improve handover between night and day shift teams?

We started by observing junior doctors on shift, tracking how tasks were logged, handed over, and followed up across wards.

We shadowed ward rounds, analysed pager patterns, and ran interviews across roles and departments.

What we found was a fragmented, manual process:

It quickly became clear the issue wasn’t just handover. It was the entire system of clinical task management.

We captured user journeys across roles, from junior doctors to nurses to on-call consultants, and mapped both pain points and strengths in existing workflows.

From that, a clear goal emerged: create a platform that supports safe, real-time task management across the whole clinical team, not just between shifts.

Define

With the problem clearly scoped, we moved into structured design and delivery planning.

We started by building out the platform foundations:

• Visual identity: Created a clean, clinical brand, logo, colours, typography, designed to signal safety and clarity
• Wireframes: Designed early task flows across mobile and desktop to support real-time updates, prioritisation, and delegation
• Vision for the product: Developed improved user journeys that reflected how clinicians really work under pressure, mapping how tasks move between roles and handovers
• Technical architecture: Designed a secure, scalable platform with mobile and web access, cloud infrastructure, and hospital system integrations
• Structured backlog: Translated clinical needs into a clear delivery roadmap with prioritised features and sprint-ready user stories

This phase turned insight into structure. We had a shared product vision, a plan to deliver it, and the support of clinical stakeholders across the trust.

Develop

With the platform defined and designs in place, we moved into focused development across both front and back end.

• Design system: Built a reusable component library to ensure consistency across mobile and desktop interfaces
• UI development: Developed the Hark app for both smartphones and web, supporting task creation, updates, and real-time team coordination
• Backend services: Engineered a secure task database, user management, and clinical data handling built for NHS environments
• Cloud infrastructure: Deployed the platform on secure cloud services with built-in resilience and compliance
• Integration: Enabled interoperability with hospital systems to ensure continuity of patient context and data accuracy

The result was a fast, intuitive clinical coordination tool that fit into real hospital workflows working on the ward.

Deliver

With the platform built and tested, we moved into deployment and live use in clinical environments.

• Training and onboarding: Delivered in-person sessions with junior doctors and ward teams to ensure smooth adoption
• Pilot rollout: Deployed Hark across 24 clinical areas at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust
• Usability testing: Ran task-based sessions to identify friction, surface edge cases, and guide iteration
• Performance tracking: Monitored response times, task volume, and usage patterns to measure impact
• Feedback loops: Embedded feedback sessions with clinical users to refine the experience and address real-world challenges quickly

The pilot proved that a digital-first approach to task management could work, improving communication, increasing visibility, and setting a new benchmark for hospital coordination.

The Impact

Hark delivered real-world improvements in clinical communication and task management, and its success was recognised across the sector.

Hark was subsequently acquired by Google DeepMind and became a core part of Streams, a clinical app designed to detect patient deterioration early.

What could your platform change?

Hark worked because it was built for real clinical environments. Shaped by frontline teams, tested in live hospital settings, and proven in both practice and research.

If you’re building a product with the potential to improve care, coordinate complex teams, or solve urgent health challenges then we can help.