West Midlands integrated care systems is to establish one of the UK’s largest health and social care records using InterSystems’ HealthShare.
The initiative will see nearly 400 health and social care providers from the West Midlands area join forces to support the delivery of integrated care in the region.
Organisations involved include Birmingham and Solihull Integrated Care System (ICS), Coventry and Warwickshire ICS and Herefordshire and Worcestershire ICS as well as hospital trusts, mental health and community trusts, local authorities, an ambulance trust, hospices and 365 GP surgeries.
By consolidating a huge volume of data that has previously been held in disparate systems, staff will be able to deliver improved, safer care that is more effective. The two-way information exchange will help ensure that staff are well informed to make decisions for each patient in the West Midlands ICS.
Through the integrated record, West Midlands health and social care professionals will have access to joined-up information, including records from medications, safeguarding information, and allergies. The information will be available to them, wherever patients present in any of the three ICSs.
In addition, the collaboration will build on MERIT, the existing mental healthcare record blueprint for the West Midlands. It will integrate information from five mental health trust systems, such as treatments, risk assessment plans, and care team and crisis intervention plans. Doing so will eliminate any potential blind spots that could lead to gaps in patient care.
Dr James Reed, chief clinical information officer at Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust and chair of the Digital Health CCIO Network, said: “We are proud to have brought together such a vast number of health and social care organisations into one system. We have already connected with six local authorities, including city and borough councils, to integrate citizen records, and have expanded on the original organisations to include additional settings such as hospices and a prison.”
Each of the ICSs has worked with InterSystems to enable locally agreed data sets to be viewable across partner organisations. The collaboration will result in one of the largest number of social care records in the country – pulling together social care records from six local authorities.
Chris Norton, managing director UK and Ireland, InterSystems, said: “What these integrated care systems have achieved, transforming care in the region, is exemplary. It shows just what is possible across the UK with greater integration and interoperability.
“InterSystems HealthShare has the potential to enable the region to effectively address residents’ needs. I’m proud of the work we have achieved in the West Midlands and look forward to expanding this infrastructure to additional health and social care services in the future for more connected, better-informed care.”
Recently, InterSystems signed a five-year deal with North West London Integrated Care System, to deliver a cloud-based interoperability service to help promote digital transformation in the region.