Healthcare Roundup

Seven days in the NHS and health IT

Sir Keir Starmer delivers speech on Labour plans for the NHS, with big role for health tech

Sir Keir Starmer, the head of the Labour Party, has delivered a speech setting out his ambitions for the NHS. He said he didn’t believe that the NHS “could take five more years of Tory government” and Labour would “fix the fundamentals, renew its purpose, and make it fit for the future.” However, he also said Labour would not “put the service on a pedestal” and there would be “serious, deep, long-term changes” to address public health challenges, make general practice sustainable, run consolidated waiting lists, and end delayed discharges.

He also promised a “move from an analogue to a digital NHS”, built around making more use of the NHS App, creating “fully digital patient records”, “putting patients in control of their own data”, and using AI to improve workforce productivity. Few of the Labour leader’s ideas are new but think-tanks generally responded positively on the grounds that many of Starmer’s long-term changes are long-overdue. On the other hand, they questioned whether Labour will be able to avoid the short-termism that besets most governments in office and where the money will come from (summary, Labour List). The BMA also argued that, to be successful, Labour must address “shameful levels of poverty in this country.”

Barclay extends and re-prioritises ‘new’ hospitals programme

Health and social care secretary Steve Barclay effectively admitted the Conservatives won’t deliver their manifesto pledge of 40 new hospitals by 2030. The pledge has been criticised for including hospitals already underway, extensions and refurbishments. But last week The BBC found work hasn’t started on 33 of these, and this week Barclay said eight projects will be pushed out beyond the target date. The Health Service Journal reported that five hospitals with cheap concrete roofs at risk of imminent collapse will be prioritised, alongside three mental health developments that were outside the programme. Making the new hospitals IT exemplars seems to have dropped out of focus.

Government pushes ‘choice’ as way to cut waits

The government is attempting to reboot the ‘patient choice’ agenda to cut waiting lists. At the moment, just one in ten patients exercise their long-standing right to choose where to go for elective care, but the government wants to increase this. A media release says that after speaking to a GP, patients will be able to use the NHS.uk website or NHS App to see information for up to five healthcare providers, filtered by distance, waiting times and quality of care, and choose where to go. Patients who have waited more than 40 weeks for an appointment will also be asked if they want to switch providers.

South Tees Hospitals positive about Miya Noting

Nurses and doctors at South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust have identified positive impacts from an implementation of Miya Noting, a digital solution from Alcidion. Digitalhealth.net reported that staff required just 15 minutes of training on the new system, but immediately reported that they were saving 30 minutes on preparing for and conducting ward rounds by moving off paper. The deployment of Miya Noting is part of the trust’s electronic patient record programme, which is underpinned by Alcidon’s modular EPR, Miya Precision. The initial noting deployment was on the older person’s medicine ward at The James Cook University Hospital.

Business news: Gabriel Radford joins Orion Health; NHS Shared Business Services opens cloud framework; Chris Scarisbrick from Sectra talks cyber security

Orion Health has welcomed a new sales director for Scotland. Gabriel Radford will support the 11 out of 14 Scottish health boards that use Orion Health technology and help them move to the cloud, extend access, and adopt new features (Health Tech World). NHS Shared Business Services has opened a new framework for cloud solutions. The Health Tech Newspaper reported that it is looking for more suppliers to join. Chris Scarisbrick from Sectra has responded to the government’s recent strategy for cyber resilience in health and care by setting out some immediate steps that could make a big difference – without burdening NHS teams (Building Better Healthcare).

Some challenges in the NHS acute tech market: and how to navigate them

Analysis

NHS trusts need a lot of technology, but they face complex, structural challenges when it comes to procurement, and these tend to work against smaller companies and innovation. The Highland Marketing advisory board met recently to discuss the issues and the role of marketing.