Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt facing ‘ongoing issues’ with EPR

The Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital NHS Foundation Trust is working to resolve issues with its electronic patient record (EPR) a year after it went live.

The Apollo system, supplied by System C, launched at the trust in May 2025 to enable clinicians to order tests or medications electronically, review results remotely and see which beds are in use.

It was expected to bring benefits for patients, such as improved sharing of information between clinicians, better access to appointment booking and rescheduling, and reduced repeat testing, hospital attendances and admissions.

However, a board paper, published in January 2026, highlights “digital constraints, including ongoing issues with Apollo not displaying complete community records”.

It adds that the EPR experienced three module outages in October and a working group has been formed “to address ongoing issues locating clinical documents due to inconsistent titling and storage”.

Mike Carr, chief operating officer and deputy chief executive at Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital, told Digital Health News: “We’re approaching the one-year anniversary for the go-live of our new electronic patient record, which we have named Apollo.

“In common with a number of implementations of these systems in other organisations, it has taken a while for the system to bed-in and realise the benefits that we expected.

“We’re currently running a programme to identify and resolve any residual issues, and we continue to work through these with the support of our supplier, System C.

“I am also grateful for the work of our dedicated in-house EPR team, who are helping us to make improvements and realise all the benefits of the system in support of delivering outstanding patient care.”

Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital signed a 10-year EPR contract with System C in July 2022, which was funded through NHS England’s Digital Aspirant Programme.

Guy Lucchi, managing director of healthcare at System C, told Digital Health News that the firm is working with the trust to “further optimise their EPR following go-live”.

“We are fully committed to supporting the trust as it realises the full benefits and long-term value of the system,” he added.

The NHSE Frontline Digitisation programme invested £1.9bn to ensure that all NHS trusts would have an EPR in place by March 2026, but several trusts have experienced issues with integrating the systems and training staff how to use them.

In April 2025, Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust flagged issues in the way that real-time observation recordings from sepsis patients were being captured on its Altera EPR.

Mid Cheshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and East Cheshire NHS Trust had challenges with outpatient productivity and reporting following the launch of a joint MEDITECH EPR in June 2025.

Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust also said that it experienced reporting issues after its Epic EPR went live in October 2023.

NHSE’s Frontline Productivity programme, which launches in April, will move on from EPR implementation to focus on EPR optimisation through tools such as clinical support and AI, ambient voice technology, and federated data platform use cases.