Matt Hancock set to announce £200m fund to overhaul ‘downright dangerous’ NHS IT systems
2 min read
Matt Hancock is due to announce a new £200m fund to help overhaul the NHS's "downright dangerous" IT systems.
The new Health Secretary is set to announce a major cash boost to reduce the risk to patients and “bring the NHS into the 21st century”.
Writing in the Daily Telegraph, Mr Hancock warned that “downright dangerous” IT systems were putting lives at risk as doctors, nurses and paramedics struggled to share vital patient information.
“The fact that your hospital can’t see your GP record, or that you as a patient don’t have control over your own data, or that even within the same hospital different departments have to write down basic details is expensive, frustrating for staff, and risks patient safety”, he wrote.
Mr Hancock is expected to tell the Health and Care Innovation Expo later today that Britain is a “global leader” in the creation of new AI technologies, and that he hopes that the NHS can now become the best in the world at using health technology to save lives.
“A world where we ask an ill patient over and over for their past medical history is a problem. A world in which a hospital can’t pull up a patient’s GP record to see the reasons for stopping and starting medications is downright dangerous”, he wrote.
And the Health Secretary is expected to announce the roll-out of a new NHS app which will allow patients to book GP appointments, organise repeat prescriptions, and ever receive urgent advice from the NHS’ 111 service.
Mr Hancock said that he had been seen first-hand the problems of the “stuttering” IT systems after spending a night shift with the London Ambulance Service earlier this year.
“For years we’ve spoken about the importance of national interoperability standards, meaning systems which can talk to each other, but I still saw staff resorting to pen and paper because their own networks simply couldn’t communicate”, he wrote.
“And don’t get me started on the fact the NHS remains one of the largest buyers of fax machines on the planet.”
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