Two leading nurses have expressed deep concern at the lack of involvement of the nursing community in the design of and preparation for the National Programme for IT.
Professor Dame June Clark, chair of the Royal College of Nursing Information in Nursing Forum, and Richard Hayward, chair of the British Computer Society health informatics (nursing) specialist group, say in a letter to the Times: “The programme can deliver as promised — provided there is engagement with frontline staff.”
The letter was written in response to the recently-published National Audit Office (NAO) report on the National Programme for IT (NPfIT) which referred to a failure to win broad backing from NHS staff.
Clark and Hayward continue: “We are, therefore, deeply concerned by the lack of involvement of the nursing (including midwifery and health visiting) community in the design and preparation for the programme.
“A function of the nurse is to act as information broker and advocate for the patient; this role is unrecognised in the programme. A recent survey by the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) found that 88% of nurses use a computer daily at work. Yet more than two thirds of respondents said they had little or no information about NHS IT developments and two thirds said that they had received no training. If this situation is allowed to continue there will be significant implementation difficulties and conflicts in practice.”
Clark and Hayward point out that the NAO report refers to consultation with doctors, yet nursing represents the largest user community of the NHS.
“It is time for nursing to articulate the importance of its contribution and to play an active part in the next stage of the National Programme for IT in the NHS,” they conclude.
Connecting for Health said the agency would not be commenting on the letter.
The Times’ letter is not the first recent expression of disquiet from nurses. An editorial in the professional magazine, Nursing Times, earlier this month protested at the news that community nurses are well down the schedule to receive help from the Primis Plus, the service funded by Connecting for Health to help primary care organisations improve patient care through the effective use of their clinical computer systems.
A late start date for work with community nurses appears not to be due to any lack of will from Primis Plus, but a reflection of the poor infrastructure available to nurses working out in the community.
A spokesperson for Connecting for Health told E-Health Insider: “Primis Plus training for nurses is intended to help NHS staff make best use of the systems once they are implemented. Systems are being delivered in each of the clusters incrementally and at different rates, which is entirely in accordance with the approach we said we would take at the start of the implementation process. Primis Plus training has always been intended to be delivered at a later date to support nurses, once more community implementations have been made.
Nursing Times commented: “Nurses do most of the work at primary care level so it is galling that they are not being provided with the necessary equipment to help them do their job well. In contrast, GPs have fared far better in terms of IT provision.”
Sharon Levy, RCN informatics adviser, told E-Health Insider that the college still found nurses who were sharing a computer with 30 other people.
He warned that current IT developments were “enshrining a GP focused infrastructure which is a twentieth century infrastructure.” Meanwhile, the health service was shifting its focus from GPs to community practitioners where nurses are the largest group, he said.
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