Over the next few months, Research for Public Benefit (RfPB) will be looking for 6 members of the public to join 6 of its 10 Regional Advisory Committees. An information pack, application form and other relevant information will be posted on People in Research website in the next couple of weeks. We will email CCF’s public contributors to tell them once the information is ‘live’. An advertisement will be posted on INVOLVE’s website, on www.peopleinresearch.org and elsewhere.
Hospitals are due to be funded to improve their “outdated” paper patient notes and prescriptions, under plans expected to be announced by the health secretary.
Health secretary Jeremy Hunt is to announce a £260m fund for hospitals to help the NHS “go digital” by 2018.
Further details were expected to be announced later today.
Mr Hunt said that using the latest technology could make the NHS “safer” by cutting down on the number of prescription blunders.
He recently revealed that 11 people died in the NHS in England last year after being given the wrong medication.
The new fund will primarily be used for hospitals to develop ‘electronic prescribing’ – which will mean doctors can use technology to order prescriptions.
It will also be used to help hospitals develop new electronic patient systems so medics from different departments in a hospital can access patient information quickly and easily.
“This fund will allow doctors and nurses to make the NHS safer by harnessing the very latest technology,” Mr Hunt said.
“In many places, right now, a paramedic picking up a frail elderly woman who has had a fall will not always know she has dementia, because he or she cannot access her notes. Or a doctor is prescribing the wrong drugs because they don’t know what drugs their patient is already on.
“If we are to improve patient safety then we must allow the NHS to have access to the best tools available and this fund will help them achieve that.”
Sir Bruce Keogh, medical director of NHS England, said: “This new fund will help patients get better and safer care by giving clinicians access to the right information when they need it most.
“Supporting hospitals to replace outdated paper systems for notes and prescriptions will help relieve patients’ frustration at having to repeat their medical and medication history over and over again, often in the same hospital, because their records aren’t available.
“Expanding the use of electronic prescribing of medications in hospitals will help improve safety, save lives and save taxpayer’s money.”
Mr Hunt has previously set out ambitions to make the NHS ”paperless” within the next five years. He also said that GPs should make patient records available online by 2015.
9.28am: The ConservativeHome blog has written a commentary on the politics of Jeremy Hunt’s NHS IT announcement.
9.26am: Jeremy Hunt is today set to announce a new drive on – and investment in – electronic prescription and recording systems in hospitals.
The Daily Mail, which has been given details of the announcement, reports:
“The Health Secretary will signal the end of written prescriptions today.
“Jeremy Hunt is to unveil plans for a £260million system that will dispense drugs electronically and, he says, prevent needless deaths.
“At least 11 people died in the NHS last year because they were given the wrong drugs or incorrect doses.
“Medicines are being prescribed incorrectly because patients’ notes are lost, while research suggests that eight per cent of hospital prescriptions have mistakes in them.
“Mr Hunt will announce that he is accepting a key recommendation of the Francis report into the scandal at Mid Staffordshire Hospital, in which hundreds of patients are thought to have died needlessly, for better use of technology to improve care.”
The fund will first be used by hospitals to replace paper-based systems for patient notes and prescriptions, a key step towards an entirely digital NHS by 2018.
The three clinical commissioning groups covering the Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland regions were one of the few areas to be granted a three month extension to the original 1 April deadline. Commissioners had hoped to launch the non-emergency service, provided by Derbyshire Health United, in June.
But in a statement today the CCGs said it was “important to ensure the service was fully fit-for-purpose and met local patients’ needs.”
The launch of NHS 111 has been plagued with problems due to unexpected demand with too few call handlers, long waits for calls to be answered and fears this has impacted on local hospital attendances.
NHS England has supported the decision to defer the launch of the Leicestershire NHS 111 service.
Dr Avi Prasad, lead for NHS 111 in Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland said: “Any delay in implementing a new service is disappointing but the safety of patients must always come first.
“We’ve learned lessons from other areas where the service is live and we are working with DHU to ensure that we have a high quality, fit-for-purpose service that properly meets the needs of patients living in Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland. The system will only go live in our area when the CCGs are confident that it is ready to do so.”
A decision on a revised launch date will be made in due course.
In the meantime discussions are on-going with current NHS Direct and GP out-of-hours services to ensure continued services until the new service is launched.
Last year was heralded as the year of DIY health – in 2012 patients looked increasingly to diagnose themselves through various websites and applications (apps). Patients went to their doctors with a “better” understanding of what was wrong with them, and more opinions on what drugs they “should” be prescribed. This year, with patients more accustomed to accessing information about their health through these digital channels, it is time for the healthcare industry to step up its game.
Using apps to maintain and improve our health makes sense. Our mobiles are the most cherished devices we own, and with us 24/7. Add to this the growing popularity of using apps to monitor fitness, and it is obvious that they could offer a great route to better engage consumers in their own healthcare programmes.
The problem is that, while consumer appetite for these kinds of apps has grown, the apps still suffer the same issues and stigmas as web-based information sources on disease and health. Many of these issues can be glossed over but some cannot. Indeed, as reported by the Guardian, apps can actually be harmful to our health. What we need is guidance as to which apps are good for our health and why.
Increasingly, consumers expect this guidance to come from their healthcare professionals as part of their treatment programme. But professionals need advice on the apps too.
Over the past few years, a number of app verification organisations have been set up whose role is to identify which apps are fit for purpose, but the mobile industry needs to be doing more – not only to help the healthcare industry ascertain which apps could work for their patients and why, but to help the apps evolve into useful tools for them.
Apps work best where the features of the mobile device are used to good effect. In the health space, this means that apps are better suited to managing and treating illness – despite the trend towards using apps to self-diagnose. For example, some of the best apps out there make use of the diary/logging aspects of mobile phones to help manage illnesses.
Of course, if apps are to become a more integral part of treatment programmes, the basics have to be right. But the healthcare industry shouldn’t ignore their full potential. In the next two to three years, patients will be able to record biological functions automatically through apps. This is likely to start with the automatic continuous recording of pulse, blood pressure, and blood sugar levels, before moving to recording of drug levels in blood and organ function. When this happens depends on when the measurement technology is available. Mobile devices already have the capability to record, plan and report on the data; it just needs to be used!
By making better use of the capabilities offered by mobiles, we can significantly improve effectiveness in the healthcare sector. Consumer engagement with their own treatment programmes will increase, not only helping healthcare professionals to identify issues earlier on but to monitor more effectively how their prescribed treatments are working.
The biggest barrier to the widespread adoption of apps as part of a treatment programme is trust of the apps from within the industry. For years, patients diagnosed with a disease have been told not to turn to the internet for advice or to go only to trusted resources However, with the plethora of fitness apps demonstrating that they can have a positive impact on physical health, the industry should start putting some faith in apps.
Apps are much more robust today than when they first launched and they will continue to improve exponentially as technologies evolve and the next generation of “digitally savvy” doctors start to promote them. I’m not suggesting that we will soon see mobile phones taking on the role of doctors, but I do believe that apps will become more widely used in both the diagnosis and treatment of all our ailments.
With consumer demand for these apps set to keep growing, the question is: who will provide them? If the pharma and healthcare industries don’t act now and invest in providing robust, well-tested apps then the army of bedroom developers will step in to meet these consumer demands at a cost to both the industry and consumers.
Ashley Bolser is managing director of marketing agency Bolser
Do take a few minutes to watch this excellent film
Deciding Right – Planning your care in advance, a new guide which tackles the difficult subject of care and treatment towards the end of a patient’s life.
Planning your care in advance
Thinking about the future and making plans for potential health and social care can be difficult. Nobody is obliged to plan their care in advance, but by talking to those who provide care for you, you can communicate your wishes for any future care. Talking to your nurses, doctors, care home manager, social worker, family or friends about your wishes is important should you become unable to make or communicate your decisions because of serious illness or disability.
West Leicestershire CCG have developed a new guide to help patients consider what care and treatment they might like to receive if they should become seriously ill, disabled or unable to make decisions for themselves in the future. The guide also offers advice on how to have discussions with your care providers and explains how to record your decisions.
Download our guide ‘Deciding Right: Planning your care in advance’ for more information.
Quality care
West Leicestershire CCG want to ensure that quality underpins everything we do and the Deciding Right programme has held events so GPs and other Leicestershire health professionals can share best practice on supporting patients at the end of their lives.
GPs, clinical coordinators, palliative care nurses, adult social care providers and representatives from secondary care in West Leicestershire have had the opportunity to learn more about the Deciding Right programme, receive guidance on having conversations with patients and been provided with tools and resources to help them implement the programme.
Work is also ongoing to ensure health professionals across West Leicestershire are fully supported in their roles as end of life care providers. As the programme continues, more guidance will be issued on how to open discussions, record patient decisions, put care plans into action and how to share plans with other health and social care providers.
Working together for you
Health professionals and partners from across Leicestershire have come together on the Deciding Right programme to help provide patients with more choice about their care. Together they have tapped into a wealth of experience and expertise to make sure patients are able to make informed decisions about their future care and talk openly with their care providers about their wishes.
West Leicestershire CCG has worked in partnership on the Deciding Right programme with:
There are a lot of good artists in YouTube video production – check this out!
Doctor-Professor fusing creatives with clinician-researchers to design health media that engages.
Small drawing of qualities I hope for in my patients.. Not same as what I measure in clinic?! pic.twitter.com/VnKhdm9MAO
There has been some great progress on SCR (Social Care Record) creation in recent months; it won’t be long now before more than half of the population has one of the records.
This is down to the efforts of GP practices and CCGs (Clinical Commissioning Groups) around the country, who have been supported every step of the way by the SCR implementation and clinical teams.
The NHS is changing too. The SCR programme team now sits within the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC), which was established as an Executive Non-Departmental Public Body on1st April 2013. The programme is now being sponsored by NHS England and will form a key part of its drive towards an integrated healthcare record.
The SCR team are working hard to build new relationships with the CCGs, who are so crucial to ensuring the successful completion of the SCR public information programme and to driving the creation of SCRs within GP practices.
Recent months have seen a critical mass of records achieved in many areas of the country. As a result, it’s becoming increasingly feasible for staff in urgent and emergency care to start viewing SCRs because they can be more confident that the records will exist for them to reference.
Achieving a substantial increase in SCR viewing remains the programme’s top priority. It’s great to be able to report in this issue that, where viewing is happening, clinical staff say it is making a real difference to the quality and safety of patient care.