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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
Siobhan McArdle left South Tees Hospitals Foundation Trust with a bang in 2019, declaring “life is just too short” for the “very challenging financial and regulatory environment” she had to deal with.
This was not the last we would hear about the management consultant turned NHS chief executive though, thanks to the generous pay and rewards package she managed to negotiate at the trust.
In October 2019,
HSJ revealed she had been paid £53,000 in overtime payments on top of her already beefy £240,000 annual salary in 2018-19. Dozens of her peers pointed out they routinely work extra hours for no extra bread.
Then after the trust’s annual report for 2019-20 was published last year, it was revealed that she’d been given another £23,000 in overtime payments for the first half of that year, plus another £180,000 in lieu of her notice period, plus another £60,000 chucked in.