The Changing NHS

Given all the recent hoo-ha about the need to extend GP opening times I don't expect this will go down too well with the RCGP - but here's a primary care physician in New York City who doesn't have an office!

See Jay's site here

As Jay says; I am your easily accessible doctor. Jay focuses on serving adults aged 18-40 and offers e-visits booked direct by patients. E-visits can include use of video chating, IM and digital photos.  (You can pay also for home visits if you are registered with him).

I wonder if there are any GPs in England planning to practice in this way?

nhs

e-visits

GPs

Well, curiosity has finally got the better of me, for better or worse, here's my first attempt at a podcast.

A recorded telephone interview with Phil Molyneux, Chief Information Officer of NHS Yorkshire and the Humber Strategic Health Authority. Phil answers 5 questions about the changing nature of IT/Informatics in the NHS.

The interview is in 2 parts (because the Skype recording service stopped after 15 mins!). Yes, I really should have paid for the upgrade in service. 

In File 1 (14:59 and 10MB) Phil deals with:

Q1) What’s the biggest challenge facing informatics/IT staff in the NHS today?

Q2) In many industries today you see technological possibilities heavily influencing consideration of business and marketing strategies. Would you say this is true in the NHS as well?

Q3) Do you consider yourself to be an informatics professional and if yes, what’s the relationship between informatics and general management and does this relationship need to change in any way?

In File 2 (11:56 and 8MB) he addresses:

Q4) What do IT/Informatics staff need to focus on in-order to become more effective at work? What new skills do they need to acquire?

Q5 To what extent might Web 2.0 type applications begin to make more of a dent in how staff, patients and members of the public experience healthcare services?

 Hmmm, I guess that just about finishes off any deluded hopes I had of a career in radio.

Steve

nhsIT

I’ve been playing around with Twitter. Me and a million other people I guess. I’m not sure if it can ever be a useful tool for learning but its’ certainly addictive! I woke up at 4am with lots of twittering in my mind. If I share these I might be able to move on to breakfast.

Steve is wondering….

• if paradoxically Foundation Trusts are more risk averse than other NHS Trusts?
• why nurses don’t seem able to strongly influence decisions about future patterns of healthcare?
• if acute trusts will seriously get to grips with productivity issues in 07/08?
• whether the NHS can learn to shift from seeking continuous improvement to discontinuous innovation?
• if PCT leaders will ever be able to behave in a truly strategic fashion?
• if NHS staff can ever learn to welcome the private sector?
• if acute providers can be more receptive to new business start-ups with exciting services to offer?
• whether healthcare will ever be replaced by software?
• if the NHS can shift from just offering choice of location to also offering choice of treatment?
• if talent is leaving the NHS faster than it is joining?

Visit at your peril!

Steve

healthcare

nhs

Twitter

change management

www.stevepashley.co.uk

You can write what I know about the details of NHS IT / Connecting for Health on the back of a postage stamp, but I do know one thing - that the NHS is wasting massive opportunities to transform how care is delivered by not taking full advantage of the knowledge and skills held by IT and informatics professionals already working within the NHS.

When almost every other industry you can think of is or already has exploited the potential of IT to re-inventing business models and offer more value to consumers we are stuck in the black hole of Connecting for Health.

I have recently spent a fair bit of time with senior IT people and have been amazed at how disconnected they feel from local strategy making processes. They seem to have allowed themselves to become labelled as the ‘techies over there’ – to be kept at bay from the strategy makers on the Trust Boards at all costs, preferably by the Finance Director.

Yes, a large part of the responsibility for changing this situation rests with IT people themselves – they need to become more proactive, seeking opportunities to show how IT can help support and even reshape local delivery strategies. To do this they need to begin to see themselves as a central part of the general management community and get much better at personal skills such as building relationships, communicating in ways that hit the right buttons and exerting influence without formal authority.

BUT, surely, Trust Boards and CEs need to help by inviting them to the party. Far too many CEs behave as if they see IT as being about ‘connecting grey boxes’ rather than what it really is - the power to remake relationships in ways that lead to more value being created for customers. Spotting and nurturing talented IT professionals and helping them to become influential members of the Board must be a key task for any Chief Executive.

If we are to succeed in remaking the relationship the NHS has with patients, carers and local publics then we will do so by changing how people experience the 80% of care that is offered and delivered at a micro level in what we currently call Primary Care and this, in large part, means getting much better at spotting and then realising the potential that mobile technology and web-based software offers.

There are lots of IT people out there who understand this, loads of them, but they are stuck in their professional silo, watching as missed opportunities flow past the window.

Steve

www.stevepashley.co.uk