Three common traits of successful NHS tech projects
From stakeholder engagement to SaaS, how public sector healthcare projects hit their targets.
Carol McGovern worked on the APM Award-winning North Cumbria NHS Trust Maternity Transformation Project via its technology provider, Clevermed. Having spent 20 years in project roles both within and alongside the NHS, she knows that the health service needs successful tech projects.
“It's so limited in terms of budget that tele-health and e-health solutions are the only way we're going to be able to continue developing innovative care,” she says.
“We can't continue with the old models. They clearly don't work. The costs are getting bigger, and we have an ageing population, so we simply have to do something different. And innovative IT is a sensible, cost-effective measure where we can do something different and creative without bursting the budget.”
McGovern’s sentiments are echoed in other projects across the NHS. Project managers around the organisation have learned lessons from past failures, such as the National Programme for IT (NPfIT). Jo Stanford, corporate portfolio manager for Health Education England, has seen it first hand.
“As demands on the services increase as the population ages, many types of digital and AI technology can enable us to meet these challenges,” she says, giving three examples:
- the use of wearable tech and behaviour-based diagnostic algorithms to reduce outpatient appointments and increase the level of self-care and virtual monitoring;
- joined-up health and social care services using patient data and service provision for automated planning and scheduling of appointments and hospital beds, for reduced waiting times and maximised capacity planning; and
- the use of genetic and disease diagnostic testing using portable tech in the community for prevention and early diagnosis.
By bringing in these technologies, the NHS will be able to free capacity for healthcare professionals to engage with more compassionate care, complex diagnostics and decision-making, and proactive horizon scanning, rather than reactive crisis management.
So what are some common traits of successful NHS IT projects?
They are local, not national
Many of these successful projects are driven by local needs and delivered at the local level, with information on successful projects shared between trusts. The first factor was driven in part by policy change. Following the review into the NPfIT in 2011, the coalition government brought in new legislation to empower individual trusts and organisations within the NHS to take on IT and technology projects. This was a catalyst for smaller-scale innovations that have worked as blueprints for other trusts and hospitals to take on.
They use cloud technology and software as a service (SaaS)
The advent of cloud technology and SaaS has made complex systems much more affordable and easy to install. The risks associated with implementing IT projects are greatly reduced, allowing NHS organisations to take a punt even when funding is tight.
They put people at the heart of the projects
Neither of these factors would make much difference without stakeholder buy-in. Successful NHS tech projects engage directly with frontline staff and patients to ensure that the project itself delivers the benefits it should. The NPfIT failed in part because it was an entirely top-down project. Tony Blair announced the programme himself, and little effort was made to find out what would work for frontline staff or patients.
Technology projects inevitably come with a degree of cultural change. Unless you bring your people with you on that cultural journey, it is destined to fail.
Eddie Obeng, founder of Pentacle (and Project columnist), who has consulted on many NHS technology projects throughout his career, says: “Once you get into the public sector... the real objectives disappear. Within the health service, they know they’re trying to improve health, but it’s so hard to define compared to a project that is about making money.”
As a result, stakeholders must be highly engaged to ensure that objectives align closely with real organisational needs. That’s the crucial element that successful NHS IT projects are getting right.