NHS records scheme ‘may have wasted millions’

The Commons Public Accounts Committee said parts of the National Programme for IT – designed to create electronic patient records for use across the NHS in England – have proved unworkable.

Launched in 2002 with an estimated cost of more than £11 billion, the Department of Health has spent £6.4 billion on the programme so far, including £2.7 billion on patient records.

MPs said the intention of creating electronic records was a “worthwhile aim” but was one “that has proved beyond the capacity of the department to deliver”.

They added: “Implementation of alternative up-to-date IT systems has fallen significantly behind schedule and costs have escalated.

“The department could have avoided some of the pitfalls and waste if they had consulted at the start of the process with health professionals.

“The department has failed to demonstrate the benefits achieved for the £2.7 billion spent to date on care records systems.”

The report said officials have accepted they are unable to deliver the planned system and are “now relying on individual NHS trusts to develop systems compatible with those in the programme”.

This means different parts of the country will have different systems.

The report also criticises the contracts between the department and suppliers – so far £1.8 billion has been paid out to them.

“One supplier, Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC), has yet to deliver the bulk of the systems it is contracted to supply and has instead implemented a large number of interim systems as a stopgap,” it said.

The Department of Health told MPs it may be more expensive to terminate the contract than see it through, while another provider, BT, “has also proved unable to deliver against its original contract”.

In the report, MPs criticised the Department of Health’s “weak programme management”.