NHS England exists to deliver improved health outcomes for patients and to do that technology
is absolutely essential.
Technology is the means by which we can generate tools and services for professional, for clinicians,
for patients and citizens at large that will enable us to make a reality of that mission.
We need seamless flows of insight into the outcomes patients are experiencing right through
the pathway of their care.
The way in which we can do that is by having data that is interoperable.
We also believe that technology, as in many other industries, offers hospitals the opportunity
of becoming more productive.
What we know is we?re on the verge of a quantum step forward in terms of the way we use digital
technology to support the delivery of clinical care right across the spectrum of health services
from primary to community into hospital care and how we really support clinicians delivering
safe and responsive care to patients.
In order to achieve this sort of change we need leadership at trust board level and people
like chief clinical information officers, and we?re very pleased with how that network
is developing, but we also need leadership all the way down.
So if you take the example of an acute ward in a hospital, then you are going to need
a sister or senior nurse who says that personally they are going to take on this project, they
are going to make it work and push it through until they achieve benefits locally.
One of the examples of something we can do to help, is to make sure we?re putting the
right devices into the hands of those healthcare professionals.
And one example of that, which many people have seen from their own everyday life, is
if we can use mobile tablets, wireless networks we can get
decisions made right next to the patient?s bedside possibly with the patient involved.
And that?s going to be a lot better than asking doctors and nurses to move backwards and forwards
between bedside and nursing station with scraps of paper in order to get to a computer that?s
sitting somewhere else.
Of these systems, [the ones] that produce the safest and best care, it is absolutely
critical that we engage staff right from the very onset in these projects.
And the way to do that, and the best evidence from the successful trusts in the NHS show
this, is that they weave into their strategy and their narrative and their story about
what their organisation is all about, the key role of introducing new technology and
digital support to clinical teams.
One example of that is, we can be sure that we?re giving the right drug to the right patient
at the right time and that we have a record of that.
And that?s something that is very difficult to achieve with paper-based systems.
The reason why there is such enthusiasm for the whole digital technology project amongst
clinical staff, is that they understand that if they introduce the technology properly
and look at their processes and adjust their processes and, in some cases, radically change
what they?re doing, that what this will have is a major impact on the safety and quality
of care that they can give to patients.
Something we can achieve with computerisation is to make sure that at each encounter with
the patient the healthcare professional knows who else is looking after the patient, what
else is planned for the patient and what the patient has been told and thinks about their
own condition.
We can make sure that happens within organisations but also across organisations.
This is about unleashing the power of people.
Data and technology offer us the biggest chance we've had to deliver High Quality Care For
All sustainably - that means now and for future generations.
We need an NHS that is technologically far more adept, that recognises the potential
for digital services to drive not just the safety of patients on our wards, but also
put them in a position to take much greater control of their own health and wellbeing.
We see a kind of Digital Revolution being almost a precondition for a sustainable and
high quality health service.