With Christmas Day just one week away, Digital Health News asked members of our Network advisory panels what would be on their wish list for Santa 🎅 this year. 

Here is what they had to say:

James “Rudolph” Reed :

“I have always found it interesting the amount of faith that people seem to have in our systems that by making a change (for example, by putting a particular field or data item) it will magically make members of staff suddenly start doing something that they didn’t do before, or in some other way change their behaviour.

“For example – stated need ‘we need to improve our patient’s physical health’ – proposed solution – ‘add an assessment form with loads of questions about physical health’.

“So what I would really like Santa to bring me is the magic wand which I have often felt in need of which will work the magic needed to bridge this gap.

“The same wand would also take away the very understandable frustration that a lot of our staff feel about having to fill in endless forms, and would enable them to provide us with useful data to understand our work, whilst at the same time delivering greater patient satisfaction and a higher standard of care.

“A bit of a big ask perhaps… but hey it’s Christmas!”

Ade “Baubles” Byrne:

“I hope the new government will ban snake oil, and heavily tax magic beans.

“I wish for a market where I can go and buy health IT products that are modern, with a truly web-based architecture and browser client that is mobile ready. If it isn’t too much to ask I’d quite like to have those talk to other systems through standards-based interfacing. I guess open data and plug-in decision support tools are in the ‘when you’re a bit older’ category.”

Philip “Gingerbread” Graham:

“On the first day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: A PHR with full interoperability,

“On the second day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: two trust frameworks,

“On the third day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: three APIs,

“On the fourth day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: four connected nations,

“On the fifth day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: FIVE PER–CENT (revenue),

“On the sixth day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: six integrated systems,

“On the seventh day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: seven cloud services,

“On the eighth day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: eight funded projects,

“On the ninth day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: nine verified credentials,

“On the tenth day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: ten fewer passwords,

“On the eleventh day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: eleven FHIR profiles,

“On the twelfth day of Christmas my NHS gave to me: twelve LHCRs connecting.”

Lisa “Elf” Emery: 

“All I want for Christmas is an invisibility cloak to throw on when I’m in an exec meeting and the VC stops working, one LESS device to cart around and Microsoft Licensing for Dummies”

Andy “Angel” Kinnear:

“Dear Santa, I have been an extra special good boy so for Christmas can you get me a stocking full of sincere politicians, far-sighted CEOs, big thinking DoFs with oodles of revenue funding, heaps of new BCS members and Fed-IP registrations, a peace accord in the national very local conflict, an explanation of blockchain that does not involve Burnley FC, a league 2 championship victory for Crewe Alexandra, a new job and gallons of BawBrew Beer for my amazing, wonderful, adorable network friends! From Andy, aged 51.”

Fiona “Merry” McDonald:

“Patient control over which health data is shared with whom, through an electronic portal, personal owned records, less empire building more collaboration, honesty with the public about what’s really going on with health data, regional budgets for those of the ground rather than begging from NHSD/E/X, an end to capital payments for IT and move to revenue, collection of email addresses on PDS and a move to emailing the patients rather than sending snail mail and Santa to replace inadequate leadership 😉.”

Shera “Candy Cane” Chok:

“My wish would be for NHS panels to be as diverse as the Shuri Summer School and Barts events!”