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I read today the cost of the NHS IT project to date stands at £2.7 billion with projected completion costs likely to reach £11.4 billion!! To me, mind boggling.

Precisely WHAT does this money get spent on??

Profligacy in the extreme, and it looks like the whole project is close to being binned as it doesn't work.

If you're talking about the patient records computerisation scheme, then it essentially involves transferring all patient medical records over to computer; where I work, all patient records are on computer (its labourous task inputting the data to the system lol), we are almost paper-free now (though we do still retain paper records for archive and back-up (the system occasionally decides to crash) - and the doctors/nurses who "are not dinosaurs" can't talk highly enough of the system, it makes their job sooooooo much easier, allergies and noteable conditions etc can all be linked, and can interact with the prescriptions system for instance if a drug is not suitable; instead of going through years worth of paper medical records prior to and during a consultation, and having to rely on the patient to know and understand any conditions they have, the information is instantly available on-screen.

If you are admitted to hospital out of area, the patient records can be transferred via the N3 link at the touch of a button, within seconds, we run allsorts of software including INR programmes, better prescribing programs etc, that all interact with the computerized patient records system.

Unfortunately, the system is failing for a number of reasons; a lot of patients are simply not on computer yet, whether this be due to a lack of time or funding is unclear, but I can't understand why tbh, given we have ~28,000 patient records on the system, with about 8000 or so fully populated from birth until today. The other problem is, a lot of the older generation of the medical staff don't like it, they are stuck in the dark ages and prefer to do things the old way and seem unable to grasp the benefits that such a system can bring, so there is not complete support for the system.

The main problem though, is probably the usual NHS employing too many managers and admins to oversee it; ie. a supervisor has a mananger who in-turn has a manager who is managing a team of managers who are managed by a manager who is part of a team of regional managers overseeing regional development, who is part of team of national managers who is overseeing the national development, who in-turn is part of a team that is supervised/managed by a bunch of executives, who are handed the responsibility for overseeing the operation by some cabinet of old chaps in whitehall who are too busy fiddling their expenses to notice that the whole project is hemoraging funds faster than an amateur amputation loses blood, and on top of all that, you have some MP or select committee/quango expecting results, but completely out of touch with the real world, and the man/woman actually responsible for the data input lol.

On top of that, to be frank, there is a lot of people employed within the NHS, who, were they in the private sector, would have been sacked a long-time ago for basically taking the piss/being lazy little sods! Some people are even unable/unwilling to the jobs they are supposed, with many incapable of using some of the IT systems required and following procedures and guidelines as they should in an effort to do less work (with little regard for the wellbeing of the patients or covering thier arses such anything happen).

tl;dr lets get Matt fired and save the NHS some money?

Indeed