Airedale NHS Foundation Trust is preparing to go live with its new Oracle Health Millennium EPR this weekend.
In January, the trust noted additional capital and revenue pressures versus the EPR’s business case, with the programme given an overall rating of amber in the board assurance framework. This update also stated that progress had been made on stabilising the EPR programme, with governance implemented, and go-live planning and process mapping underway.
The go-live is scheduled to take place 17 and 18 October, with final checks and staff training forming part of the preparations.
A leaflet shared with patients to inform them of the upcoming transition acknowledges that some small delays in recording notes are to be expected as staff adjust to the new system, but that overall the change will mean needing to repeat information less often.
“Your care team are being trained, and will have extra support to help them during the changeover,” the trust shares. “We’ll be working to keep disruption to a minimum.” Appointments will be going ahead as normal, it adds.
The trust also outlines further potential benefits in the move to the new system, such as improved communication between care teams, reduced need for information to be entered more than once, and foundations for future digital services.
Wider trend: EPR
HTN was joined by a fantastic panel including Shanker Vijayadeva, GP lead – digital transformation at NHS England (London region); Rosie Gilbert, head of digital programmes at Sherwood Forest Hospitals; Tom Stocker, CHIO and EPR advisor; and Jatinder Punia, director of sales at Nervecentre, to discuss the future of EPRs. Our panel considered the road ahead in the short, medium, and long term; the potential for AI, AVT, and automation; emerging opportunities; and practical realities of EPR programmes on the ground.
The Committee for Health and Social Care in Guernsey has shared updates on its EPR programme, highlighting outcomes from phase one and a decision to “transition towards closure” in favour of a rolling programme of improvement. “These are difficult updates, but it is important that the Committee is transparent with the community about how these capital programmes have developed since their inception,” George Oswald, president of the Committee for Health & Social Care, said of both the EPR and Hospital Modernisation programme. “We recognised the problems with these programmes of work and foresaw the difficulties that would come with trying to push ahead regardless. Now, we have made what I consider to be the entirely appropriate decision to stop.”
BSW Hospitals Group, formed of Royal United Hospitals Bath, Great Western Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, and Salisbury NHS Foundation Trust, has shared progress toward the 2026 go-live of its shared EPR, highlighting appointments to senior leadership positions, and work to date on benefits realisation and process mapping. The group has moved to appoint Jonathan Hinchliffe, interim chief transformation and innovation officer, as EPR senior responsible officer.
