Aneurin Bevan health board has approved a £981,146 project to replace all its paper health records with a “resilient” digitised system.
The first phase of the south west Wales board’s project, to be carried out in the current financial year, will centralise all health record facilities at a site in Newport, and allow for the disposal of out of date and archived records. This phase is estimated to cost £482,680.
A second phase in 2012-13, costing £498,466, will cover the scanning of paper records using an IT system which will be integrated with a Welsh clinical portal to provide scanned images to clinicians.
A “scan on demand” service will allow patients who have more than one appointment on the same day to have their records viewed across several departments on separate sites, without the delays caused by manual transfer.
The business case for the project says it will reduce duplication and new processes and technology will deliver more effective services. Although the new system will bring recurrent revenue costs of £564,600, the document says these costs will be offset by “considerable” savings.
Centralised digitised records will replace the current system in which health records are held by individual acute and community hospitals. Among the problems with the current system identified in the business case are that when patients move between sites this can lead to an incomplete medical history for the clinician to view.
Disparate storage and movement of records can also lead to appointments being cancelled, unnecessary follow-up appointments and repeated diagnostic tests.
In addition, the opening of Ysbyty Ystrad Fawr local general hospital later this year will result in the closure of the existing Caerphilly District Miners hospital, leading to a need to redesign the medical records system and re-house 90,000 medical records.
Aneurin Bevan board’s project team is meeting fortnightly to deliver a work programme. According to the team the main risk at this time is around the delivery of the new storage facility in time to support the opening at Ysbyty Ystrad Fawr.
Another potential risk is the implementation of the Myrddin patient administration system during October 2011, a crucial time for the transfer of records from Caerphilly District Miners hospital to the new site.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2010
It is interesting that the advocates of this scheme can issue exact quotes, such as, 'second phase costing £498,466'. Does this mean that if the cost is more that the Aneurin Bevan Health Board does not have to pay? I don't think so.
Also there will be 'recurrent revenue costs of £564,600', for those who speak English that means an annual bill. This does not matter because there will be 'considerable savings', which I note are unquantified. What savings, £10 M, £20,000? I see that they are reluctant to tot them up.
I have a feeling that, with such woolly figures, this will not be the last news story where this digitisation scheme is mentioned.
The real reason for this scheme is so that our medical records can be accessed by Councils and Council Officers, and local and National Police bodies.
The health board will not deny this process, or, the intention to share personal medical records of you and me with other bodies, our medical records are no longer confidencial, in fact, mine should be because I have danied the Health board the right to share my medical records with any else other than health professionals. anly time will tell if they break the law in respect to my instructions, if they do, and I shall have no hesitation in seeking hefty compensation from them they have been warned.