This is a strong report by theNAO-
factual and clear. There have been some achievements - theNPfIThas improved the profile, importance and training of IT
staff in the NHS. It has made IT and its potential benefits a
talking point at board level. A later add-on to the NPfIT, PACS
digital x-ray technology, has been a success, making diagnoses
quicker and reducing the need for unnecessary x-rays. The N3
broadband network is a success.
But the NPfIT, if flawed, cannot be sustained by PACS, the N3
network or even the extraordinary commitment of thousands of IT
professionals and NHS staff. It cannot be sustained either by the
strength of its unarguably well-intentioned objectives. It needed
to be soundly planned and achievable. There are doubts about both.
The NAO report raises questions about whether the most important
part of the National Programme for IT, the plans for England-wide
shared electronic medical records, will ever happen.
The NAO says the scheme is feasible, but only if fit-for-purpose
software is installed - and there are doubts all trusts, especially
foundation trusts, will want to install it. Ministers are
discovering that an IT-based scheme conceived at the centre cannot
be imposed on a devolved NHS - a lesson that should have been
learned from failure of the centrally driven Wessex Regional Health
"RISP" programme in the 1990s.
It's unfortunate for the NHS and taxpayers that the National
Programme for IT was conceived in secret, without adequate
consultation with the medical professionals and without enough
independent challenge of assumptions. The government needs to be
much more visible in the way it approves big projects - and more
open about the progress or otherwise of those schemes.
We're believe strongly that if ministers and Whitehall officials
knew at the time they first discussed big IT-based change
programmes that all would be revealed about how their biggest
IT-based change projects were going, they would think twice before
they launched a scheme that was unachievable.
Tony
Collins' IT projects blog >>