Digital and data across ICS regions: South East
For the next instalment of our ICS regions series, we’re heading over to the South East region, to take a deep dive into some of the latest developments, insights, strategies, and more around digital and data.
The South East region is home to six integrated care systems: Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West, Frimley, Kent and Medway, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, Surrey, and Sussex. We’ll look at each of these in turn, exploring their digital strategies and updates, highlighting commentary from key stakeholders, and covering some of the news shared over the last year.
Insights from the South East
We spoke with Surrey and Sussex Healthcare (SASH) NHS Trust, who shared their priorities around patient safety, ED performance, flow through the hospital, reducing length of stay, and “of course, looking after our people”. Critical to these efforts, the trust reports, is the smooth and timely discharge of more complex patients, with the Integrated Discharge Team (IDT) “playing an essential role in facilitating this important transition”.
To ensure that the trust’s digital team can effectively support the trust’s core teams, SASH shares: “We have been invested in optimising and creating digital solutions to some of IDT’s biggest challenges – we have moved the management of IDT patients from a secondary system into our Oracle Health EPR, taking a huge step forward in making discharge planning more streamlined, transparent, and – most importantly – better for our patients.
We introduced electronic referrals to IDT direct from our EPR, no more emails, calls, or “word of mouth” referrals. Clinical teams now place referrals directly into Cerner, making sure patients who need extra support post-discharge are identified early. The IDT now track and manage all patient updates direct into the patient record so everything’s in one place. We also provided ward teams an even clearer view of their patients’ progress and next steps. Better communication = better planning, and of course better outcomes!” Since the go-live, the trust credits its Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycle and “a firm belief that those who do the work are the ones who improve it”, with helping to optimise workflows and ensure that its digital tools are “working their magic to make our staff’s daily tasks smoother and more efficient”.
The trust’s Digital SASH+ Production Board, which it describes as “the ultimate digital visual display for managing daily operations on the “genba” (aka the heart of the action)”, offers a snapshot of the current state of play, driven by real-time data, “converting complex on-the-ground processes into a clear overview so teams can compare expected vs. actual performance”. These boards “play a major role in fostering a culture of accountability and efficiency”, and help SASH’s teams track their progress in real-time. “Every day, teams at SASH gather around their Team Production Board for a huddle,” the trust reports. “What’s a huddle, you ask? It’s a quick, high-energy meeting where teams review the previous day’s performance, understand today’s service demand, celebrate wins, address any issues, assess staffing, set objectives, prioritise tasks, and make sure everyone’s aligned on the day’s goals. These huddles are vital in helping the team stay in sync and spot any bumps in the road before they turn into problems. Huddles are all about staying quick, focused, and on top of things without slowing down the momentum of the day.”
Looking ahead into the rest of 2025, the trust shares that it has a number of projects getting ready for launch, including additional Care Pathways and Digital Hospital Out-Of-Hours. “By fully leveraging the digital tools and systems currently in place, together with the practice of an embedded improvement system we can drive greater efficiency, enhance user experience, and ensure that every feature is used to its full potential,” it states. “For us, it’s not about adding more to the stack, but about refining and improving what’s already there to better serve both our teams and the patients who depend on us. Continuous optimisation and improvement, rather than constant expansion we believe, is key to building a truly successful digital hospital.”
Digital strategies
Kent and Medway Shared Delivery Plan
Kent and Medway ICS wider Shared Delivery Plan, places a large focus on the role of digital in adult social care, including through digital pathways, a digital front door, and technology enabled care. It also highlights the potential for digital to help improve equity in access to health and care.
More details on the ICS’s digital work and priorities can be found in board papers from September, where part of the ICS’s strategy for 2024/25 – 2029/30 is also presented. It notes that digital and AI are “not progressing as a system and productivity is not as good as it would otherwise be”, highlighting that the ICS is the least digitally mature system in the South East region, and ranks 32 out of 42 ICSs. Large parts of the estate and infrastructure are “not fit for 21st century effective healthcare”, it continues.
Digital is also covered as an enabler of the organisation’s Green Strategy to 2029, with the ICS looking at sustainable digital alternatives for all documentation and communication processes, and the opportunities for digital to help reduce emissions caused by travel to appointments by offering virtual care. In particular, it looks to its virtual wards programme as a means of supporting the shift of more care to the community, committing to exploring options to use smart tech in buildings and continuing to innovate with digitally enabled care over the next five years.
Hampshire and Isle of Wight Digital, Data and Technology Strategy
Hampshire and Isle of Wight’s Digital, Data and Technology Strategy sets out plans to utilise digital for virtual care and data to shift toward proactive and preventative care, to deliver person-centred care by providing clinical teams with data and information, to maximise use of system resources by facilitating closer working between teams and implementing innovative tools, and to continued research and innovation. “In the future staff will be able to access joined up care records, across our region, without multiple log-ins,” it states. “They will have the skills and confidence to work digitally and flexibly. Our leaders will be enabling the delivery of our digital ambitions and we are attracting talented digital experts to work here.”
Information sharing will be improved, the strategy continues, whilst digital systems will be simplified and modernised, and investments will be made in systems and infrastructure, harnessing tech such as AI and RPA to reduce the administrative burden and support decision making. The ICS will be looking to increase use of the NHS app as a digital front door, to support initiatives around upskilling and digital literacy, and to deliver a single acute provider EPR. Interoperability work will reportedly see the streamlining of communication between primary and secondary care, digital and tech infrastructure will be simplified in line with best practice, and data across systems will be integrated to support preventative care.
Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West’s Digital & Data Strategy
Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West Digital & Data Strategy, centred around three core objectives: digitising providers to establish a core level of digitisation across the system, connecting care settings and using technology to improve citizen experience, and transforming data foundations to better meet the needs of the population. With a focus on EPR and common infrastructure, virtual care and digital inclusion, the strategy’s roadmap presents deliverables for 2025/26 including establishing a cloud strategy, consolidating patient portals, and developing ICS infrastructure standards.
A progress update highlighted 26 separate programmes led by tech, data, clinical teams and local users, as well as the completion of a digital maturity assessment to help guide future investment, and “efforts to include patient and local voices in the strategy”. There’s been an emphasis on collaboration with all providers, it continues, whilst a cyber strategy and a single data infrastructure have been developed to “simplify and standardise” IT systems, reportedly supporting clinical teams in delivering urgent and emergency care, elective care, and reducing waiting lists. The ICB is also focused on connecting data across multiple IT systems to improve patient care, build joint pathways, and address wider determinants of health with linked data and population health management.
Challenges identified in the progress update include current low levels of digital maturity in primary care in the South East, with plans to address this through the Primary Care Strategy, but a “persistent issue with insufficient capital budget” and “uncertainty” around a rejected business case. Capacity issues are also noted as affecting data sharing, and whilst progress has been made with the connection of ambulance services to the shared care record, further development “remains a focus”.
Frimley Digital and Data Strategy
Frimley’s Digital and Data Strategy shared the aim of building a strong digital foundation and providing patients and staff with the digital tools and technology they need. Steps outlined to achieve this include harmonising digital assets, broadening the use of shared care records and increasing the use of data for proactive decision making, empowering residents, and working toward a single share analytics platform to facilitate population health management.
In the board’s latest meeting in March, an update on planning for 2025/26 shared a focus on developing a strong population health management approach to how care is planned and delivered, and on using digital tools and innovation to improve efficiency, quality, and outcomes. The ICB’s Wavelength programme is also highlighted for its role in fostering system-wide digital transformation, supporting staff in the development of digital skills required to utilise digital innovations effectively. As part of this, it states, showcases of best practice in digitisation, such as in the automation of workflows with intelligent processes, contribute insights into digital innovation. “By empowering leaders—regardless of their technical expertise—to integrate digital and data-driven solutions into their transformation efforts, the programme helps embed a more joined-up approach to digital innovation across the system,” it notes.
Embracing digital technologies in Surrey
The system’s Integrated Care Strategy places the development of more joined up digital infrastructure on its list of key priorities, focusing on digital technology as a means of providing seamless care, and on developing the workforce whilst the digital, data and technology offer is strengthened across the ICS. It notes the need to increase digital maturity through initiatives including the digital social care record and virtual wards. For data, it commits to developing a system-wide integrated data and digital platform, a system intelligence function, and a population health hub to enable the sharing of successful interventions and innovations.
Reaching digital maturity: How an NHS trust transformed IT to unlock innovation and funding with Rackspace Technology
At Digital Health Rewired 2025, we attended a session led by Jason Jones, the Global Customer Manager for Healthcare at Rackspace Technology, who shared the transformation story of an acute and community health NHS trust based in the South East of England. The session highlighted how the trust overcame longstanding IT challenges to significantly improve digital maturity, unlock major funding, and enhance both clinician and patient experience.
In today’s NHS, the ability to innovate through technology isn’t just a competitive advantage, it’s a mandate being set at the highest levels of government. This trust, serving over 500,000 patients annually across two acute and five community hospitals, faced significant challenges in achieving its vision for a digitally mature, agile, and patient-first organisation.
The challenge: Low digital maturity and technical debt
The trust had a low digital maturity score, marked by aging infrastructure, repeated service failures, and an overburdened internal IT team focused on maintaining legacy systems rather than enabling innovation. With on-premises data centres at multiple sites, it struggled with reliability, cyber vulnerabilities, and a lack of transparency around system dependencies.
These limitations posed a significant roadblock to implementing a new electronic patient record (EPR) system, an initiative central to its 10-year strategic vision. In order to unlock the necessary funding from NHS England for such transformative technology, the trust first needed to modernise its IT foundation.
The turning point: Building a resilient foundation
Rackspace Technology was brought in to help address the technical debt and enable digital transformation. Over a three-month period, Rackspace conducted a comprehensive discovery project involving internal IT stakeholders and third-party vendors. This audit provided a clear, actionable view of the trust’s hardware, software, infrastructure, compliance status, and workload dependencies.
The result was a carefully designed hybrid cloud solution tailored to the needs of the organisation. Rather than defaulting to a single cloud platform (public cloud only), Rackspace evaluated each workload to determine the optimal environment, ensuring flexibility, performance, and compliance.
Over 300 critical applications were migrated with zero unplanned downtime and no disruption to patient care. Crucially, the migration strategy preserved the integrity of connected medical equipment, avoiding unnecessary changes that could impact frontline services.
Post-migration: Security, stability, and strategic focus
Post-migration, Rackspace Technology assumed responsibility for infrastructure management. This allowed the internal IT team to shift focus from operational firefighting to strategic initiatives that directly enhance clinician and patient experiences.
The new environment meets NHS compliance requirements and maintains full digital sovereignty, with no data leaving the UK. Enhanced cyber resilience was evident when the trust was able to confirm within 30 minutes that it had not been affected by the Synnovis attack, thanks to improved visibility and protection.
Furthermore, Rackspace provides ongoing optimisation and ensures alignment with evolving technology and industry best practices, positioning the trust to adapt to future healthcare challenges.
The outcomes: Funding, capacity, and innovation
With its IT foundation transformed, the trust significantly improved its digital maturity score, unlocking £71 million in funding from NHS England. This funding is being used to deliver major innovation projects, including the rollout of a new EPR system and the launch of the PatientFlow AI platform.
An additional benefit of decommissioning on-premise data centres was the repurposing of physical space, resulting in the creation of 12 new patient beds, directly increasing capacity to serve patients.
Conclusion: A blueprint for NHS IT transformation
This acute and community health NHS trust’s journey underscores how resolving legacy infrastructure challenges can create the foundation for transformation at scale. By partnering with Rackspace Technology, the trust not only addressed critical technical debt but also unlocked funding, freed internal resources, and enabled cutting-edge digital initiatives.
For other NHS trusts looking to improve care delivery through technology, this case study offers a compelling example of how thoughtful infrastructure modernisation can deliver measurable and sustainable value.
Health tech in the South East region: snapshots from the past year
For HTN Now we welcomed James Driver, digital innovation manager at Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West ICB, to talk about some of the work going on around going green, and the role of digital in supporting the sustainability agenda across health and care. When it comes to the net zero agenda at BOB ICB, James shared that one of the main focuses is on virtual wards and out of hospital care. “We’re looking at how to deliver a virtual ward model within the net zero and sustainability agenda,” he said, “and that’s coming back to the principal that many patients are better cared for at home, and that home has better outcomes for their recovery after an initial hospital admission. If you can link the pathway model and nursing model with telemedicine and remote monitoring, that’s a win-win scenario in that you’re improving outcomes for patients whilst offering a more sustainable out of hospital model.”
James also joined us for a separate panel discussion on the topic of health tech and innovation for the future, sharing insights around fostering a culture of innovation, overcoming challenges, nurturing ideas, and more. Sharing his thoughts on upcoming innovation and the direction that might take, James talked about plans at BOB ICB to focus on and consolidate “things that have worked”, such as digital triage, which could be boosted by improved functionality planned for the NHS app. RPA is another area James noted as potentially upcoming, “with clearer guidelines for which products or apps that might work with or how that might work with GP systems.” James also talked about wanting to see clearer procurement guidelines “around what tools and technologies should be used, what type, and how ICBs can then scale that up for greater effectiveness and benefit across the health system.”
Dr Tamara Everington, chief clinical information officer and haematology consultant at Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, formed part of a panel discussing how to take a pragmatic approach to digitising NHS records. Tamara started by sharing insight into her role and remit as well as where Hampshire Hospitals is in its digital journey. “As a trust we became part of the national GDE programme and that was helpful in accelerating our digital journey. We made a huge amount of progress through the pandemic and we are now a largely digital organisation, which has been based on a ‘best of breed and integrated’ approach.” The trust is currently in the position of trying to procure a shared PAS and EPR with core functions across the acute provider footprint within the integrated care system, Tamara added. “In some ways, some of the things we are doing are really forward-thinking and exciting like our patient engagement portal, which is part of the NHS App Wayfinder Programme, and we’ve got digital prescribing sorted out. But we are still on our journey to scanning in our documentation, and there are other areas that we need more focus on.”
For an HTN Now session on patient communication and engagement, Laura Adams, patient and public involvement and engagement facilitator for research and innovation at Medway NHS Foundation Trust, shared her perspective and contributed to discussions around successful approaches, technical considerations, integration, change management, and more. Laura talked about her perspective from research, including main findings around the need for flexibility and considering who you are trying to engage with when designing interventions and services. Also, she said, it’s important to consider the best times and dates to reach your targeted community. “You’re not going to catch working parents at 1pm on a weekday,” she pointed out. “It’s about thinking who you’re trying to reach and then going to them, rather than expecting them to come to you. Also you need to think about the audience when you’re designing materials or events, like Bex said with ensuring that content is catered to a certain level to keep it widely accessible. We make sure that our research is translated into a lay format and do a lot of work to get it to a level that is actually readable. They’re scientific journals and it can be very difficult for us in the medical profession to understand, let alone the general public; so I do think tailoring communication is a key point.”
Manzoor Ahmed, patient and public involvement leader at Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust, took part in a webinar on the future of patient portals, including future directions, technologies, challenges, and more. “In an ideal world, in maybe ten or twenty years’ time, maybe we’ll see AI playing a greater role, but I think to have a greater level of adoption, we need to have simple solutions which are built around what staff need, which will improve the way they work,” Manzoor said. “I’ve spent time in wards where new technology like a new EPR system is introduced, and you can say, ‘well, that was adopted successfully’, but the staff continuously struggle to use that technology. It’s the same with patient portals, we need to think about what capability our patients have.”
And Stephen Bromhall, interim chief officer for digital and data at South East Coast Ambulance Service, shared his perspective as part of a panel discussion on digital integrated care, new models of care, and moving from reactive to proactive. Putting the right care around the patient and focusing on delivering what they need in the most effective way, so “we’re not pushing them into that acute medicine space” is essential, said Stephen. “That’s where using technology can support things like remote care – perhaps how we transform the pieces of this conversation we’ve had is looking at what we’ve already got and using that more effectively to create a multiplying effect, without spending more money.” He pointed out that the NHS has “a lot of great assets – let’s use what we’ve got across our systems and partners before we go and spend a lot more money going through yet another change programme. We’ve all got change fatigue and want to look at what we’re here for, which is putting the patient at the middle of all we do.”
