NHS hit by new tech failure as it scraps patient booking technique

MPs were told by NHS staff that even though some GPs liked Decide on and Guide, a lot of did not, and that not all appointment slots were obtainable on it. Photograph: MBI /Alamy

The NHS is quietly ditching an electronic booking system for outpatient appointments, Decide on and Book, which has price £356m given that 2004, in a even more signal of the issues of introducing efficient IT programs into the well being support.

The choice to replace it with a possibly even more pricey e-referral scheme by 2016 follows a drop in its use by medical doctors and sufferers.

Throughout a latest investigation into NHS waiting occasions by the Home of Commons’ public accounts committee, MPs had been told by NHS staff that while some GPs liked Select and Book, many did not, and that not all outpatient appointment slots have been offered on it, limiting its usefulness.

NHS England said final evening the new e-referral method would use different technological innovation, but it was unable to say how significantly the scheme would price.

Meg Hillier, a Labour member of the committee, explained: “It is yet another NHS cock up. A system designed for use by GPs but only used by half of them … has been quietly dropped, so quietly that even most of the NHS would seem unaware.

“In the middle of all of this are individuals. Choose and Guide was supposed to velocity factors up but the proof we heard in committee showed this was not so in most circumstances.”

Choose and Book was introduced by the Labour government to enable patients needing an outpatient appointment to select, with their GP, a hospital appointment at a practical date and time. The aim was to pace up the procedure and lower out the want for pricey paperwork.

The Division of Overall health desires sufferers to turn into a lot more concerned in managing their appointments. The National Audit Workplace has estimated that one.6m patients failed to turn up for first outpatient appointments in 2012-13, costing the taxpayer up to £225m.

But several patients and medical professionals located Decide on and Book complex and time-consuming. Tory MP and former GP Sarah Wollaston said the method suited individuals who had been excellent with engineering but not these who had been much less so. She explained doctors often did not have time to log on to it throughout appointments with their patients.

Wollaston, a member of the Commons choose committee on health, additional that technology could have disadvantages.

“You do have to be cautious that when setting up this type of method utilizing the most current techology, that you do not inadvertently end up widening wellness inequalities in the approach.”

Una O’Brien, the long lasting secretary at the Department of Health, stated the substitute scheme would have further attributes, and would be be available on mobile apps.

She informed the Commons committee: “We are aiming to have a hundred% electronic referrals within the subsequent 5 years – sooner than that if we can make it. That will cut out a good deal of these errors.” The idea of generating it compulsory for GPs to use the substitute program when it comes on stream, with an inbuilt incentive and penalty scheme for doctors and hospitals, is becoming regarded.

The choice to drop Decide on and Book, and admissions that it was not becoming employed by many doctors and patients, marks the most current of numerous IT failures in the NHS, exactly where attempts to embrace technologies in the quest for far more joined-up care have encountered several delays and price overruns.

A £12bn venture launched in England in 2002 aimed to let 50 million patients’ records to be held electronically so that they could be accessed by employees in distinct elements of the services: principal care, hospitals, out of hours solutions and ambulance crews. But it was scrapped by the coalition following a series of setbacks.

NHS hit by new tech failure as it scraps patient booking technique