Chancellor Rachel Reeves has today announced £29 billion investment to get the “NHS back on its feet and fit for the future”, with up to £10 billion set to be allocated to tech and digital transformation. Speaking to the House of Commons, Reeves noted: “There’s no strong economy without a strong NHS.”
The funding was included during the Spending Review, aimed to enable the NHS to deliver on the Plan for Change, with announcements also covering training thousands more GPs to increase the number of available appointments, and mental health support across all schools.
Elsewhere, new funding has been granted to security, economic growth, and devolved nations, with devolved administrations to receive “their largest real terms settlements since devolution began in 1998” in a move the government hopes will help them to deliver on local priorities.
Clean energy and affordable housing were also on the Chancellor’s agenda, with £39 billion of investment allocated over ten years to a new Affordable Homes Programme, and a commitment of £14.2 billion for Britain’s “first state-funded nuclear power station since 1988”.
View the spending review here >
Digital transformation for health and care
For a recent HTN Now panel discussion, we were joined by a panel of experts from across the health sector to discuss how general practice, PCNs, and ICBs can utilise data and leverage technology to support operational efficiencies and improvements across primary care. Panellists included Kathryn Salt, assistant director of primary & community care, data and analytics for the Transformation Directorate, NHS England; Dr Shanker Vijayadeva, GP lead, digital transformation for the London region at NHS England; Dr Sheikh Mateen Ellahi, GP and practice partner at ELM Tree Surgery and South Stockton Primary Care Network; and Max Gattlin, digital consultant at X-on Health.
We recently spoke with David Newey, interim chief digital transformation officer at Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals NHS Trust, about the future of EPRs. David spoke about some of the challenges of successful EPR implementation, with a particular focus on the financial pressures within the NHS and healthcare and how vendors can better support this transformation.
A recent panel discussion saw HTN joined for a discussion on the role of digital in NHS reform by Dawn Greaves, associate director of digital transformation at Leeds Community Healthcare; Ananya Datta, associate director of primary care digital delivery at South East London ICS; and Stuart Stocks, lead enterprise architect with Aire Logic. Panel members shared their insight and experience from a wide range of digital projects including EPR and Shared Care Records, highlighting what worked well and their learnings; how their organisations are currently tackling key challenges such as capacity and demand, and managing waiting lists; and balancing risk with innovation.
NHS England has published its latest roadmap for the future of the NHS App, highlighting aims to increase users’ ability to self-serve, support operational efficiency and costs, and to design the app to support health system performance indicators. The roadmap covers health records, appointments, prescriptions, integrated services, messaging, design and navigation, and platform and analytics, noting what has been completed to date, what has been worked on, and what is next for the NHS App.
Another HTN Now webinar, we were joined for a panel discussion on the topic of optimising and adding value to EPRs by an expert panel including Ciara Moore, unified EPR programme director at Mid and South Essex and Essex Partnership University; Neill Crump, digital strategy director at Dudley Group NHS Foundation Trust; Stacey Spence, EPR programme manager at Medway NHS FT; and Andrew Harrison, product manager at Imprivata. The session focused on approaches to EPR and next steps following initial implementation, as well as what the future holds for EPR best practice.
