Tony Collins's IT Projects Blog

Comment

On 9 August 2007, BBC Radio 4's The World Tonight posed the question on ID cards ‘can this project come in on time and under budget’ on the day that the government invited companies to bid for the project contracts, worth £2bn.

On the programme I pointed out that James Hall, the experienced Chief Executive of the Identity and Passport Service, has been innovative in the design of the contracts.

An anonymous reader says, with clear conviction, that some journalism on the NHS's National Programme for IT [NPfIT] is simply unhelpful. The reader is responding to an entry on this blog over the NHS's relationship with Microsoft.

The reader also makes the controversial point that "clinical expediency will absolutely require lapses in that security". The comments in full are below, as is my response.

The Health Committee of the House of Commons is to publish a report on aspects of the NHS's £12.4bn National Programme for IT [NPfIT] without the contents of the document being agreed by all of the MPs on the committee.

For those who'd rather not read the 250 pages of the latest Wanless report the following paragraphs are excerpts that relate directly or indirectly to the NHS's National Programme for IT [NPfIT] They are in the order they appear in the report. There is some repetition in the paragraphs.

Derek Wanless, a founding father of the world’s largest civil IT-based programme, has questioned whether it should continue without an audit of technical aspects, finances and benefits.

Below is an article posted today on Computer Weekly's website about an MP's criticism of a "weak" report by the Health Committee on the electronic patient record, which is part of the NHS's National Programme for IT. A blog comment on the committee's report will be posted later.

Comment and summary of highlights of a report on the Electronic Patient Record by the Health Committee of the House of Commons

Comment

As predicted, the Labour-dominated Health Committee of the House of Commons has avoided calling for an independent review of the NHS's National Programme for IT [NPfIT] but its report makes a series of compelling arguments for one.

Jean Roberts,who leads the British Computer Society Health Informatics (HI) Forum Policy Group and sits on the general BCS Council, has given a personal reaction to the findings of the latest Wanless report.

Derek Wanless, a founding father of the NHS's National Programme for IT, questioned in a report published this month [September 2007] whether the NPfIT should continue without an independent audit.

In May 2007 Gordon Brown said in a speech: "Government must be more open and accountable to Parliament".

But Computer Weekly has learned that government action to try and stop publication of reports on the £12.4bn National Programme for IT in the NHS, and the £5.3bn ID cards scheme, could stall the release of the information for years - despite rulings by the Information Commissioner that the documents should be made public.

It was known that the Treasury's Office of Government Commerce was to go to the High Court under the Freedom of Information Act to try and stop the publication of early Gateway Reviews on ID cards. Gateway reviews are independent assessments on risky IT schemes at various stages in their lifecycle.

Computer Weekly has now learned that the High Court case is unlikely to take place before June 2008. This is nearly two years after the Information Commissioner Richard Thomas ruled that early gateway reviews on ID cards should be made public.

These early gateway reviews are already ageing - they were written in 2003 and 2004.

This a longer version of an article published in Computer Weekly and on ComputerWeekly.com.

An NHS primary care trust has warned of a new risk to the confidentiality of medical records stored under the National Programme for IT [NPfIT] after a celebrity was admitted into hospital and more than 50 staff viewed the patient’s records.

The warning by North Tees Primary Care Trust raises questions about whether hundreds of thousands of NHS staff who would be able to view electronic records under the NPfIT would have their accesses to information policed robustly.

Mary Hawking writes:

The only thing surprising about this incident is that anyone should be surprised! Ross Anderson [of the Cambridge University Computer laboratory] pointed out the risks in 1995...

Interesting reader comment on the blog entry NPfIT security warning after NHS staff view celebrity record

The amiable and knowledgeable Remon Gazal, IM&T director at Barnet and Chase Farm Hospitals NHS Trust, spent his last day at the trust yesterday (20 September 2007). He said he was leaving to get married in Australia. He has not yet decided on his next job.

Computer Weekly interviewed him on his last day at the trust about the lessons learned from implementing in July 2007 the basic "Cerner R0" Millennium system from BT as part of the NHS's £12.4bn National Programme for IT [NPfIT].

The go-live, which was strongly supported by the NPfIT and BT, brought some important benefits to the trust, such as real-time management of bed occupancy and also brought disruption for some patients. Workarounds have been developed for defects that continue to have an operational impact.

Barnet and Chase became the first trust in London to use the Cerner R0 patient administration system as part of the NPfIT.

My interview with Remon Gazal will be published as a separate blog entry.

Link:

Congratulations to Barnet and Chase Farm Hospitals NHS Trust

A political documentary to be broadcast on Monday evening, 24 September, on Channel 4 was filmed in part at the offices of Computer Weekly.

Details have emerged of an incident last year in which the electronic medical records of former England football manager Sir Bobby Robson were viewed illicitly by NHS staff when he went into hospital.

He needed surgery in August 2006 for a brain tumour. He was treated by Newcastle Upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.

Channel 4’s “Dispatches” documentary on Monday 24 September 2007, to which Computer Weekly contributed, questioned whether the guardian of public spending, the National Audit Office [NAO], is too close to some of the departments and agencies it audits.

Labour MP David Taylor, an auditor by profession and former computer manager, told the programme: