Tim Almond

NHS IT 4 Years Late

It will be at least 2014 - four years later than planned - before a single NHS electronic patient records system is in place in England, say auditors.

What the hell? This was started in 2002. It’s going to have taken 12 years to deliver a patient records system?

But an NAO report said the project was on budget and that staff thought it would improve patient care.

Oh good. The staff think it will improve patient care. We’re spending £12 billion and we’ll get some patient care improvement. When you’re spending £12 billion and the financial savings are about £1 billion, that means that about £11 billion of that are going to supposedly improve patient care, I think we should be told what exactly we’re going to get from that £11 billion in terms of care improvement. Something that can be measured against the system.

However, the technical challenges involved have led to significant delays and some trusts, desperate to replace ageing systems in order to offer the government’s “Choose and Book” service for patients, have been forced to install “interim” systems which will eventually have to be replaced again.

If there’s a delay which has caused this, how can the NAO accurately say that the project is on budget? This is a cost caused by the CfH project, so should be included, shouldn’t it?

And why should these be replaced again? Why not integrate them? If these systems will do what a trust wants, let them carry on, but insist that they provide web services that other trusts can communicate with.

In fact, that’s all that CfH should be doing. Leave the trusts to build their own systems to their own needs, but set standards on data interchange - so when someone from Brighton walks into a hospital in Bristol, the Bristol computer can talk to the Brighton computer to get the details. The technology to do this isn’t difficult anymore.

Tags: Politics, Software Development, Technology, Health //