UK s National Health Service still reliant on paper notes and drug charts despite electronic upgrades medicalxpress.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from medicalxpress.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
A continued reliance on paper, revealed by a BMJ survey, is less safe and efficient. And difficulties with sharing electronic records are preventing even the most advanced trusts from realising their full potential, writes Jo Best
Three quarters of trusts in England that responded to a BMJ survey are still reliant on paper patient notes and drug charts, despite progress towards electronic records and prescribing. The survey results came in just as an expert panel convened by a House of Commons committee concluded that the UK government had failed to meet a key target to eliminate paper prescribing in hospitals and to introduce digital or electronic prescribing across the entire NHS by 2024.1 Going paperless has been an NHS dream for some years: in 2013, then health secretary Jeremy Hunt challenged the NHS to go paperless by 20182; migration to electronic patient records (EPRs) remains a priority for the NHS today.
Under the NHS Long Term Plan , trusts are being challenged to achieve
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