News
Primary care system suppliers partner to supply IT systems for new
health centres
9 July 2008
EMIS and INPS, the main GP systems providers in the UK, and Adastra,
the leading provider of out-of-hours and unscheduled primary care
solutions, are to work together to produce an integrated IT system to
support GP-led health clinics.
The new collaboration will see EMIS and INPS' clinical management
software interoperate with Adastra's operational system, which is used
in 95% of unscheduled and out-of-hours care hubs in the UK.
The end result will be a comprehensive 'joined up' IT system designed
specifically to meet the needs of the new generation of healthcare
provider organisations envisaged in Lord Darzi's NHS Next Stage Review.
Both the interim (published Oct 2007) and final report (published 30
June 2008) mention the funding of 150 new GP-led health centres to
provide GP-registered and walk-in primary care and other services from
8am to 8pm, seven days a week in areas without suitable provision of
services.
In a move away from the idea of creating a monolithic single system,
the new product will build on the components and data of the three
partners' existing systems, with additional functionality where
necessary fully utilising interoperability with partner products.
INPS and EMIS have agreed to interoperate on future projects,
ensuring that these new products can benefit from the patient records
held in their respective systems. This will mean that this patient data
can be securely shared across a wide range of healthcare settings and
builds further on the existing relationship between EMIS and Adastra.
Work is already underway on the development and configuration steps
needed to ensure that a conjoined system is available well before the
April 2009 deadline for many GP access centres to go live.
The project has received a very positive reaction from service
providers, who are being consulted for their needs as part of the
development process.
Dr Mike Rooney, Clinical Director of the Mastercall service in
Stockport and a representative of the North West Regional Provider
Group, believes he is witnessing a major breakthrough: "This is a very
compelling systems model which will make it much easier to drive the
integration of discrete services in each locality."
Dr Charlie Stuart-Buttle, chair of the EMIS National User Group, is
similarly enthusiastic: "This development reflects the spirit of the
times — rather than reinvent the wheel every time the healthcare
landscape changes, users want to build on locally successful and popular
solutions. This is excellent news."
While the primary focus for the project is to provide a new IT
solution for GP-led centres, the collaboration also offers the potential
to benefit existing and future out-of-hours care.
Lynn Woods, Chief Executive Officer of Adastra, said: "Many
operational hub services supporting out of hours care have integrated
with NHS walk-in centres and are starting to intercept primary care
traffic presenting to A&E. This collaboration offers the potential to
better support all urgent and unscheduled care episodes, wherever they
present."
Sean Riddell, Healthcare Managing Director of EMIS, said: "This is a
landmark project which will combine the benefits and expertise of three,
best-of-breed clinical and operational healthcare IT systems. Although
it is still early days, we are very excited about the potential of this
new collaboration to transform the healthcare IT market."
Max Brighton, Managing Director of INPS, said: "INPS, like EMIS and
Adastra, is firmly committed to interoperability as a way of extending
our service offer to both existing and new customer groups. This moves
decisively in the direction of allowing local health communities to
choose what works for them at a pace that suits them best. We are
delighted to be part of such an innovative project."
The three leaders stressed that the new system would be compatible
with, and complementary to, NHS Connecting for Health's Summary Care
Record.
Tom Davies chair of the National Vision User Group also applauds the
initiative: "I am pleased with the continuing cooperation between the
two major GP suppliers and Adastra which will enable us to build on what
we have already. This should protect our patients' care in the new world
of primary care that we have to work in."
As well as GP access centres and existing out-of-hours provision, the
new working collaboration also has the potential to drive the
development of further IT solutions to support: long-term conditions,
practice-based commissioning, referrals management and other specialist
and out-of-hospital services.
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