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06/06/2026 2:06 am
TL;DR: The NHS Digital Maturity Assessment now lets organisations compare digital capability with user experience, exposing a persistent gap between deployed systems and frontline usability, according to Imprivata. The real lesson is that identity and access are not supporting functions but the control plane that determines whether digital investment translates into safe, usable care.
NHIMG editorial — based on content published by Imprivata: As the NHS gains increased visibility into digital maturity and user experience, DMA findings signal where progress is needed
Questions worth separating out
Q: How should healthcare organisations balance digital security with clinician usability?
A: They should measure both together and treat access as part of the care delivery model.
Q: Why does identity management matter in digital maturity programmes?
A: Because identity is the control layer that determines whether users can actually reach systems, complete tasks, and trust the environment.
Q: What breaks when access controls create too much friction?
A: Users build workarounds, support demand increases, and security rules lose legitimacy.
Practitioner guidance
- Measure access friction alongside maturity scores Add login success rates, step counts, and session continuity to the same reporting pack as infrastructure and interoperability measures so identity is evaluated as part of digital maturity.
- Map workflow breakpoints to identity controls Identify where clinicians create workarounds around authentication, role switching, or session timeouts, then trace each issue back to a specific identity control that is producing the friction.
- Align security design to care-setting movement Review whether access patterns still work when staff move between wards, devices, and organisations, then redesign federation and access handoff where the current model creates delays.
What's in the full article
Imprivata's full analysis covers the operational detail this post intentionally leaves for the source:
- How the NHS DMA and usability datasets were structured and compared across organisations.
- The practical difference between digital maturity measures and clinician experience measures.
- Why frontline access friction is being treated as a governance issue rather than a pure IT issue.
- How the assessment data can be used to support investment, accountability, and service improvement.
👉 Read Imprivata's analysis of NHS digital maturity and user experience gaps →
Digital maturity and IAM: what NHS teams should act on now?
Explore further
06/06/2026 3:35 am
Digital maturity without identity usability is an incomplete control model: Organisations can deploy modern systems and still fail to deliver reliable access where it matters. The NHS assessment reinforces a broader identity lesson: deployment is not the same as operational control. If clinicians cannot move through systems efficiently, the programme has not achieved maturity in any practical sense. The practitioner conclusion is that access quality must be treated as part of the control surface, not as a separate service issue.
A few things that frame the scale:
- The average organisation believes more than 1 in 5 of their non-human identities are insufficiently secured, according to The 2024 ESG Report: Managing Non-Human Identities.
- 72% of organisations have experienced or suspect they have experienced a breach of non-human identities, with 46% confirmed and 26% suspected.
A question worth separating out:
Q: How can teams tell whether access is improving digital experience?
A: Look for fewer login steps, more consistent session behaviour, fewer reported access workarounds, and better satisfaction from frontline users. Those signals show whether identity controls are supporting real work. If the environment is technically mature but users still struggle, the access layer is failing the programme.
👉 Read our full editorial: NHS digital maturity shows the gap between capability and access
