The digital transformation is bringing the NHS into the 21st century. And I want to be part of the journey.

It’s news to nobody that the healthcare system needs to be modernised and brought into the 21st century. Indeed, the NHS is the only place in my personal or professional life where I still use pen and paper. These outdated operating procedures come at a price; they are not only slower and less efficient, which leads to higher costs to the taxpayer, they are also more likely to lead to human error. Both of these factors negatively affect patient care, sometimes with dreadful consequences.

And yet, change is possible. I was moved to act after hearing a heart-breaking eulogy from a mother, who lost her young son to sepsis, a condition that moves fast and requires immediate attention. I spearheaded the award-winning ‘Kissing Goodbye to Sepsis’ campaign to help put an end to this unnecessary suffering.

Working towards improving patient care is incredibly rewarding work. For this reason, I am happy to be collaborating with EPR vendor PatientSource by joining their recently announced Clinical Leadership Panel in the role of Nursing Lead. PatientSource have launch their panel to bring together leaders from across the industry to support clients in their digital transformations. 

I came across with PatientSource while working at James Paget University Hospital as a Transformation Nurse and I immediately fell in love with the system. I am not surprise that PatientSource is expanding rapidly. When the opportunity came across to get involved and joined the Clinical Leadership Panel I immediately said yes.

With increasing financial pressures, staff constrains and soaring demand, our health system is under extreme pressure. To be able to continue deliver good quality care and absorb the continue demand we need to work smarter.

Despite the benefits that a properly implemented EPR solution can bring, there are significant barriers to adoption, the largest of which is the lack of interoperability between different systems. To see the full picture of the care that a patient needs, I often need to log into six or seven different systems. I will end up wasting 10 minutes for each patient, going in and out of systems to check that everything is up to date. If I have eight patients to care for, that is 80 minutes of my time that I spend on remembering passwords, instead of on patient care.

PatientSource can solve this problem. Unlike large EPR vendors, PatientSource as an SME has the advantage of being much more flexible, adaptable and capable of shaping their EPR solutions to fit the specific needs of each implementation. I have been impressed by the team’s hard-working and agile nature, with a capacity for finding solutions in record time. This is something that I want to be a part of.

With my clinical background in nursing, I will be able to advise clients during the implementation phase to ensure that the project makes sense from the point-of-view of a clinician and solves real problems that we have at the moment on the frontline. I will help to ensure that the solutions are suitable and are something that I, as a nurse, would want to use and would feel comfortable using.

This is something I want to be a part of, because I believe that given the pressure on the health system, we need to work smarter in order to continue delivering quality care. Making the most of digital transformation will help to tackle staffing shortages and ensure that nurses spend more time on patient care.

LET'S TRANSFORM THE HEALTH OF MILLIONS BY MAKING HEALTHCARE SMARTER

Let's bring our healthcare system to the 21st Century.

Exciting times ahead.