Staff are continuing to back the NHS's £12.4bn IT
programme - but support for the scheme among the IT professionals
who have to implement it has waned, a Mori survey has
revealed.
Connecting for Health, an agency of the Department of Health,
has published on its website a summary of the latest survey on the
National Programme for IT (NPfIT) by Ipsos Mori.
The summary lists the positive findings from the survey of NHS
staff, including IT managers, administrators, doctors and nurses.
But it makes no mention of Mori's negative findings. A spokesman
for Connecting for Health defended the website summary as balanced,
saying the full Mori report was available for download.
Telephone interviews with more than 1,000 NHS staff, including
158 IT managers, established that the NPfIT is regarded as an
important initiative; and most indicated that it will improve
clinical care.
But since Mori conducted a similar survey in 2005 there has been
a big drop in the number of IT and other NHS managers who are
favourable towards the NPfIT - even though IT managers are
generally more supportive of the scheme than other groups of NHS
staff.
Separately Mori reported a big jump in the number of IT managers
who agree with the statement that "the programme will be too costly
at the expense of medical care". In 2005, 52% of IT managers
disagreed with the statement, and only 26% agreed. This year it was
more even: 45% disagreed and 41% agreed.
Four years after the scheme was launched, 25% of doctors - the
main users of the NPfIT systems - told Mori they had never heard of
the programme.
Mori said two concerns have more resonance with staff today than
in 2005: the cost of the programme and the skills needed to make it
work.
Lack of staff knowledge and training is seen by every group as
the main barrier to rolling out NPfIT effectively in the NHS.
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