The government has assembled a taskforce of the UK’s
leading clinical professionals in a bid to sort out problems
surrounding the implementation of electronic patient care
records.
The heads of doctors’ body the British Medical Association, the
Royal College of General Practitioners and the Royal College of
Nursing have been asked to draft a plan for the nationwide
implementation of electronic records.
The new NHS Summary Care Records Taskforce will produce a plan
for ministers by November. The Department of Health has already
announced that electronic care records will go live in a small
number of locations in early 2007 with a nationwide roll-out in
2008.
Health minister Lord Warner said, “The NHS Care Records Service
will bring benefits from the moment it’s in place, and we owe it to
patients to do this as soon as possible. I am confident that – with
support from the clinical community – Connecting for Health can and
will deliver this valuable service.”
The taskforce will study the US Deparment of Veterans Affairs'
electronic health record system, which holds a summary record of 23
million US ex-servicemen and women. In May 2006 one of the biggest
ID security breaches ever occurred when a data analyst at the
Department of Veterans Affairs had a laptop stolen which contained
data on millions of former soldiers.
In a linked announcement the Department of Health also announced
that more than 200 general practices would be able to transfer
patient records electronically between themselves before the end of
this year. This facility is one of the most important requested
innovations by GPs.
Taskforce members
- Harry Cayton (Chair), national director for patients and the
public
- Ursula Gallagher, executive director of quality, clinical
governance and clinical practice at Ealing PCT
- James Johnson, chair of the BMA
- Dr Mayur Lakhani, chair of the RCGP
- Dr Beverly Malone, general secretary of the RCN
- Dr Hamish Meldrum, chair of the BMA GPC
- Professor Mike Parker, director of the Oxford Centre for Ethics
and Communication in Health Care Practice (Ethox)
- Nick Partridge, chief executive of the Terrence Higgins
Trust
- Sigurd Reinton, chair of the London Ambulance Service NHS
Trust
- Maria Shortis, patient advocate
- Jan Sobieraj, chief executive of Barnsley FT
- Jim Wardrope, president of the College of Emergency
Medicine
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