Document management specialist PCTI has announced the completion of the roll-out of its Docman software to all GP practices in NHS Croydon.
The company says the primary care trust has funded the deployment of electronic document management, workflow and electronic document transfer software to the 50% of GP practices in Croydon that did not have it.
The roll-out means all 56 GP practices in Croydon now use PCTI software, which enables then to receive electronic documents from secondary care and electronically manage their workflow within the practice.
PCTI said practices would also received Intellisense, the company’s optical character recognition software, which automates the electronic patient letter filing process and captures Read codes.
PCTI said the deployment would reduce costs in transferring paper-based letters to GP practices and reduce back office administration overheads.
Dave Gunner, primary care registration authority and IT projects manager at NHS Croydon, said the main drivers behind the project were to improve the efficiency of the workflow within practices by reducing the paper trail in surgeries in line with paper-light working.
He said: “The real benefit of Docman is that the accuracy of data recording and processing will be improved.
"This will come from better quality data processes such as data entry, data coding and transmitting of data both internally and externally.
"The ability to search and audit more easily and effectively will also benefit practices. I personally feel that Docman is a must for all practices.”
Gunner added that he also expected efficiency savings from the receiving and processing of community and secondary care data electronically and a reduction in the need to print documents and physically scan hard copies of documents.
He said he expected savings in consumables such as paper and printer cartridges to be made sooner than staff cost savings.
Ric Thompson, managing director of PCTI, added: “I am really pleased that all of the practices in Croydon are now using our suite of products.
"In such hard economic times, the NHS needs solutions that improve efficiency and reduce costs whilst delivering against [the Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention agenda].”