Healthcare Roundup

Seven days in the NHS and health IT

Think-tanks predict Budget silence on NHS can’t last

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt delivered his first full Budget on Wednesday. He argued the economic forecast wasn’t quite as bad as it had been, made some interventions on childcare and innovation, and found money to hold down fuel duty and raise lifetime pension pot ceilings – which might encourage some senior consultants to stay in the NHS (full Budget speech on gov.uk). The Budget had little else to say about public services, which were dealt with in his emergency Autumn Statement last year (Highland Marketing analysis). But as strikes and pay talks continued, think-tanks predicted this position would not hold.

Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, pointed out that the NHS has been funded for a pay rise of 3.5% next year, but if rumours of a 5% deal are true, it will have a “budget hole of anything up to £2 billion” that the government will have to fill or see filled by cuts to patient services. Taylor also noted that the Budget dodged the publication of the long-promised NHS workforce plan, addressing an estates maintenance backlog that has reached £10.2 billion, and the urgent need to set budgets for social care and public health for the new financial year.

NHS England publishes ‘who does what’

The NHS England transformation directorate has published the ‘who does what’ document promised in ‘A plan for digital health and social care’. The document, launched at Digital Health Rewired by transformation director Tim Ferris, is intended to clarify the role of the centre, integrated care systems, and trusts in digitising the NHS. It comes with guidance on standards and framework contracts to use. In its news release, NHS England says the document has been developed through “engagement and partnership” with this system. Ferris told Digital Health Rewired that it will be a “living document” that “will not sit on the shelf” but evolve over time.

National attention for ‘Waiting Well’ project powered by C2-Ai

One of the most mentioned initiatives at this year’s Digital Health Rewired was the Waiting Well project run by NHS Cheshire and Merseyside, which also featured in this week’s ‘download’ column from the Health Service Journal. Clinicians from St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospital NHS Trust are using technology from C2-Ai that crunches data from Graphnet’s CIPHA shared care record to identify patients on the surgical waiting list who are at risk of chest infection. The patients are referred to Surgery Hero for coaching to help them prepare for treatment without complications. The ICB is looking to roll-out the ‘prehabilitation’ model across its patch.

Watch out for our full write-up of the keynote speeches from Digital Health Rewired in next week’s Healthcare Roundup.

NHS England says virtual wards are expanding at pace

NHS England has said 100,000 patients have been treated in virtual wards over the past year. A news release says there are now 340 virtual ward programmes up and running across England, with 58 opening in January alone. This takes the number of ‘virtual beds’ across the country to 7,653; up from 4,485 in May last year. The NHS ‘urgent and emergency care recovery plan’ wants virtual wards to be treating 50,000 patients per month. National medical director Professor Sir Stephen Powis said virtual ward are a ‘game changer’ for patients and the service – since better community care could reduce hospital admissions by a fifth.

Appointment news: interim NHS CIO named; new VP for Orion Health

NHS England has announced that John Quinn has succeeded Simon Bolton as the NHS’ interim chief information officer. Quinn is the former director of the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency. An appointment process for the substantive post is ongoing (Health Service Journal). Orion Health has announced that Mark Hindle has been appointed vice president, UK and Ireland. He has joined the company from Evergreen Life, a personal health record app provider, and says his priority will be helping customers to build on their shared care records and to use them to put information into the hands of patients (Health Tech World).

What’s the value of marketing?

Analysis

Some people think marketing effectiveness equals number of prospects reached divided by money spent. That’s too simplistic, especially when you’re taking a subtle message to sophisticated people. Highland Marketing founder, Mark Venables, considers a better way to judge marketing value.