By Jonathan Elliott, Managing Director, Epro,
The healthcare industry and the NHS have historically been inconsistent – in some cases slow – in embracing digital transformation. The pandemic has been a significant catalyst in driving change, with many NHS Trusts and partners looking for technology solutions to help with streamlining processes and addressing backlogs.
More Trusts are beginning to value solutions such as EPRs, and AI and machine learning are slowly becoming viable options within UK healthcare which can be leveraged for predictive analytics. However, whilst some healthcare organisations are becoming more digitally mature, others are at a far earlier stage of progression, raising questions about how digital transformation can be achieved in a way that is going to deliver benefits to patients and clinical staff both today and in five-to-ten years’ time. Moreover, given today’s economic pressures, how such digital change can be delivered cost-effectively, implemented effectively, whilst minimising the disruption typically associated with change management.
Jonathan Elliott, Managing Director, Epro explains, one size does not fit all; we are on a significant journey to digital transformation in our healthcare systems, but change must be incremental. We must understand how to partner together to unlock the value of digital solutions to truly reap the benefits now and in the future.
Paving the Way with AI, ML, EPR
It’s no secret that the potential of technological innovations within healthcare is enormous. The work that’s being done today with AI-driven systems, machine learning, and EPR adoption is incredibly promising, both in terms of improving diagnostics and data-led informatics, as well as clinical workflows, and developing interoperability between systems.
It doesn’t just stop there: there’s the potential for a broader integrated approach when it comes to primary care and ICSs and the innovations that are available to us, both at an individual patient level as well as population health management. Wearables, devices, tracking apps, and speech recognition are all examples of innovations that we didn’t have around as mature applications five-to-ten years ago. It’s exciting to see and there’s strong reason to believe that this trajectory will persist and increase over the coming years.
Empowering Trusts with Digitalisation
After years of celebrating the digital innovators, the NHS is now firmly focused on ensuring the digitally less mature Trusts – Group Zero – accelerate their digital transformation. With investment available (at the time of writing) and a target to achieve the minimum digital foundation (MDF) standard by the end of 2023, these Trusts are being encouraged to invest in Tier 1 EPR solutions.
Yet facing a buying cycle lasting two to three years, followed by a very extensive and disruptive change management programme, as well as technology implementation, these Trusts are looking at years and years of upheaval before any tangible benefits are attained. By the time these Trusts have achieved HIMSS level 5, the goalposts will have changed – along with the technology landscape.
And what happens in the meantime? With Trusts reporting staff vacancy rates in excess of 50% in some departments, the need is for immediate solutions that deliver real value today.
Immediate Need
Many Trusts nowadays have a clear, strong focus on digital transformation. There is no doubt that technology convergence is a priority. However, with technological proliferation comes the overwhelm of choice, and there is no one single solution; even the Tier 1 EPRs cannot deliver the entire needs of a Trust.
In order to unearth the true potential of digital transformation and truly experience its benefits now and in the future, rip-and-replace is not the answer. Organisations need to ensure that whatever solutions they adopt are integrated with and augment a raft of core, even legacy, clinical solutions already in use. They also need to reach out from the acute environment, creating a seamless, end-to-end information flow into primary and social care. If we manage to master these implementations now, advancement of such systems can and will only get better and smarter.
Interoperability Priority
One word that has become considerably commonplace in today’s health technology environments is interoperability. We will only continue to see a strong focus on this in the future.
Integrating speech recognition, for example, can rapidly address the backlog in outpatient clinical correspondence that is leaving GPs and patients waiting many weeks to receive post consultation information and referrals. Using speech recognition and digital dictation to automatically populate forms, medical secretaries need only to check the information prior to distributing it to the GP and patient, radically speeding up the process, improving the patient experience and eradicating the additional demands created by patients chasing secretaries for information.
With interoperable solutions integrated into the existing acute and primary care systems, the entire process becomes seamless, with end-to-end data flow and efficient, automated workflows ensuring both clinicians have access to the information required and patients receive care more quickly.
Managing Change Effectively
Of course, irrespective of the regulatory and clinical imperatives for change is the need to achieve this effectively, efficiently and cost-effectively. This is more important than ever given today’s socioeconomic circumstances, with trust and national budgets under huge scrutiny, even turmoil.
Now, therefore, is the time for trusts to really consider the values of their potential technology partners. Are systems home-grown, designed around the specific needs of the NHS? Can your chosen partner support you on a transformation journey that will minimise disruption and deliver incremental change? Are they a proven supplier to the NHS with long-term partnerships, which means they’re in this for the long haul?
Conclusion
The future of HealthTech is exciting. Yes, there is increasing pressure to accelerate digital transformation throughout the NHS, but we must see this as a big opportunity. Organisations face many problems at the moment, including large backlogs, the struggle to keep up with innovation, and budgetary constraints, but the potential here is vast.
Every organisation is at a different level of digital maturity; and time and cash is limited. Digitally immature trusts need a different approach to cut through the complexity and get started on their innovation journey, including easy migration to web based and cloud technologies that is fundamental for integration and long-term scalability. They need achievable, affordable, proven digital solutions that can deliver frontline change very quickly, with minimal investment and disruption.
One size does not fit all – not today or in the future. Once every organisation masters the nuances of innovative and disruptive technologies, we’ll be on our way to something huge.
Uma Rajagopal has been managing the posting of content for multiple platforms since 2021, including Global Banking & Finance Review, Asset Digest, Biz Dispatch, Blockchain Tribune, Business Express, Brands Journal, Companies Digest, Economy Standard, Entrepreneur Tribune, Finance Digest, Fintech Herald, Global Islamic Finance Magazine, International Releases, Online World News, Luxury Adviser, Palmbay Herald, Startup Observer, Technology Dispatch, Trading Herald, and Wealth Tribune. Her role ensures that content is published accurately and efficiently across these diverse publications.