The Princess Alexandra Hospital NHS Trust (PAHT) has highlighted digital achievements in its latest Quality Account for 2024/25, including the launch of its Alex Health electronic health record and the My Alex Health patient portal.
The EPR was launched in November 2024, as a single digital record of a patient’s care, including health history, treatment records, medical conditions, and allergies. Its introduction followed testing over the spring and summer months of 2024, with the trust identifying the process for migrating data from old systems, and running a “Stop, Start, Continue” information campaign showing staff how specific daily tasks would change and preparing them for training.
A purpose-built training centre was set up on the trust’s main site to support its training needs in preparation for the launch. More than 95 percent of all staff were trained prior to deployment, with the trust also supporting the implementation of 214 Alex Health ambassadors and 436 navigators, who provided “at the elbow support” to increase the quality of data entry. A two-week “Your Access Fair” helped staff register their smart cards and get set up on the system, and “dress rehearsals” were held to ensure adequate preparation for technical, clinical, and operational aspects of the launch. An event was also organised with system partners to improve patient flow across the system with an aim to reduce acute bed occupancy and patient attendance around the go-live.
On the weekend of the go-live, Alex Health was deployed in clinical specialities and wards in “a carefully planned sequence”, starting with the ED on Saturday afternoon, and with all areas live by Monday morning. Configuration and engagement continued throughout the winter months, PAHT notes, with work to support the embedding of new ways of working, additional training, and masterclasses led by subject matter experts. Over 250 system configuration changes were made to tailor the EPR to meet the trust’s specific clinical and operational requirements. A “significant amount” of work remains underway to stabilise and sustain the system, the trust states, but the programme will be moved over the coming year into part of the trust’s broader digital strategy.
The associated My Alex Health patient portal went live in March 2025, with the trust reporting 875 patient registrations in its first month in dermatology. “Of 300 patients invited to register on the portal in the first week, 99 percent registered on first invitation,” it shares. The roll-out will continue to further specialties with expected completion by the end of summer 2025. At present, functionality covers the ability to manage appointments, view hospital letters digitally, receive appointment reminders from a mobile phone, view results and reports, and receive messages from consultants.
Other examples of quality improvement projects completed throughout the year include in robotic assisted surgery, which has reportedly improved health inequalities, reducing length of stay and postoperative complications. An electronic preoperative assessment is in progress in the surgery and critical care division, with hopes of improving patient experience and optimisation prior to surgery. An MSK app has also been introduced to support the shoulder clinic, focusing on discharging patients, reducing review lists, and placing suitable patients onto the patient-initiated follow-up pathway.
Wider trend: Electronic patient records
For a recent HTN Now panel discussion on EPR best practices, we welcomed experts from across health and care, including Sally Mole, digital programme manager at The Dudley Group NHS FT, Fhezan Ashraf, clinical configuration manager at The Dudley Group NHS FT, Stacey Spence, EPR programme manager at Medway NHS FT and Hayley Grafton, CNIO at University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust. The discussion began with wider introductions, where each of our experts gave an overview of their own go-live projects before moving onto post go-live best practices, exploring key learnings and challenges when it comes to engaging the workforce and measuring adoption.
A recent NHSE board meeting offered insights on maximising productivity following EPR implementation, with the board discussing the potential to create a blueprint to allow learnings from both successful and unsuccessful implementations. This will support the next stage, being the analysis of standardisation, wider business change, local capabilities, and the impact of “peripheral technologies e.g. ambient voice”.
OneAdvanced has completed the purchase of assets relating to the Vision EPR system from In Practice Systems (INPS), ending “six months of uncertainty” for GPs and current users of the software. The company shares that by combining the Vision EPR solution with OneAdvanced’s healthcare portfolio, it hopes to create a powerful healthcare platform capable of aligning with the NHS 10-Year Plan. The company highlights its ambition for “the OneAdvanced platform to pave the way for a unified, AI-driven national health system, that is fundamental to achieve the governments neighbourhood care ambitions.”
