East Midlands Ambulance Service NHS Trust has outlined progress, emerging opportunities, and next steps from its digital collaboration agreement with West Midlands Ambulance Service.
Having undertaken a review of IT contracts at both trusts, the board acknowledges immediate savings from major services are “likely to be limited” as a result of existing commitments, technical dependencies, and operational risk. A baseline of contracts including costs, expiry dates, and scope, has been developed, and opportunities for alignment will be assessed on a case-by-case basis for areas such as shared specifications and potential joint procurements.
In particular, areas highlighted as opportunities for shared capacity or aligned ways of working include DSPT assurance and evidence management, cyber security operations and incident response coordination, and operational communications services. The board shares that WMAS is considering a reprocurement of key operational systems such as EPR and computer aided dispatch. “These are strategically important opportunities for EMAS to consider through a more common technical approach, but any commitment would require detailed assessment given the scale, cost, procurement complexity and operational criticality involved,” it adds.
Positive progress has already been made across the two trusts on establishing a technical solution enabling WMAS vehicles operating on behalf of EMAS to use EMAS’s CAD, mobilisation, mobile data terminal, and communications platforms, the board highlights. This collaboration has demonstrated differences in application development capability, it continues, with WMAS having an in-house function, and EMAS reporting growing demand for digital tools but no comparable internal capability. Future work will test out a shared application development model. An assessment is further underway on a potential shared telephony solution, with current systems at both trusts reaching end of life.
The next digital maturity assessment will be completed for both trusts in parallel, according to the board, to offer a more consistent overview of digital capabilities and maturity, as well as helping to identify “where joint action could deliver the greatest patient, operational, productivity and resilience benefit”.
The board noted: “The digital collaboration arrangement is delivering early value and remains appropriate to continue. The next phase should focus on a smaller set of priority areas, clear benefit tracking and formal governance for any substantive proposal. This will help convert early opportunities into measurable patient, operational and productivity benefits while protecting EMAS capacity, operational resilience and each trust’s legal accountability.”
EMAS recently shared the latest on its new EPR, confirming a contract has been signed with provider Terrafix to replace its current system over the next year. The trust outlines hopes for the new system around reducing duplication and improving data capture, incorporating digital clinical decision support tools, and helping with handovers in making sure all relevant information is on hand for those involved in a patient’s care.
Wider trend: Ambulance trust digital transformation
North West Ambulance Service NHS Trust is planning an upcoming procurement for a unified CAD and EPR platform, with a total estimated value of £19.3 million. The trust has issued a market notice ahead of a planned February 2027 tender, indicating requirements for the platform around minimising duplication, improving clinical safety, and ensuring real-time information flow between control room operations and care settings. The platform should be capable of managing the full patient and incident lifecycle, according to the trust, “from call intake through each care scenario including hear and treat, dispatch, see and treat and see and convey, clinical handover and post event reporting”.
South East Coast Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust has shared insights and upcoming milestones from its digital transformation programme, noting details of work around data, AI, and auto-dispatch. The service sets out a series of priority workstreams for clinical productivity, including auto-allocation of calls (hear & treat), with emergency operations centre roll out in Q1 2026/27; automation of its emergency crew advice line process with go-live expected by the end of Q3 2026/27; and ongoing work to optimise EPR information flows. Automation of clinical audit is currently being scoped, with plans for delivery in Q3 2026/27.
London Ambulance Service NHS Trust has reported on progress including work on implementing a new digital and data operating model and its plans for a 12 month automation programme focusing on low-level processes. Key leadership roles are now in place, the trust notes, ahead of a transition to the operating model designed to improve alignment between digital and operational teams and offer greater flexibility for changing organisational priorities. User acceptance testing has been completed for its electronic controlled drug record programme and the trust notes early results from ambient voice technology use, showing improvements in productivity and documentation quality, along with reduced admin burden for clinicians.
