The repeated delay to the announcement of who has won what from ‘tech fund 2’ is piling up costs, disillusioning stakeholders, and putting projects at risk. And EHI readers are fed up about it. When they’re not actively furious.

That, in a nutshell, is the message from the short survey about the impact of the delay to the outcome of the ‘Integrated Care Technology Fund’ that EHI ran last week. The fund was supposed to deliver £240m of central funding to portal, e-prescribing, and integrated digital care record or information sharing projects.

But many survey respondents fear that the money has gone; spent on ‘winter pressures’ and other, more general election friendly, announcements. The clear message from the comments to the survey is that trusts need to know one way or another.

Also, that they need to know before the end of January, because that is the last point at which contracts can be signed and money allocated for what is left of the financial year. The message from NHS England that “no news is good news” on bids is no longer cutting it. The fund needs to be tied off, one way or another.

Tech fund 2 delay puts projects at risk

The continued delay in the announcement of who has won money from the second round of the technology fund is putting projects at risk, according to a survey run by EHI.

E-Referrals set for ‘extended testing’

The Health and Social Care Information Centre will start extended testing of the new NHS e-Referral Service at the end of the month, after its go-live was delayed due to technical defects.

Royal Devon still assessing Epic costs

Royal Devon and Exeter NHS Foundation Trust is undertaking further work to assess the potential costs of implementing the Epic electronic patient record, after making a £19 million funding bid to NHS England’s technology fund.

Basildon deploys EMR solution

Basildon and Thurrock University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has completed a phased rollout of a £7 million electronic medical record system.

Wales invests £3m in sharing documents

The Welsh Government has announced that £3 million will be spent on rolling out a system to enable hospital staff and GPs to share information, including tests and clinical correspondence.

Advanced, Emis and Northgate in deals

Advanced Business Solutions has signed a deal with Kronos to provide its workforce management software to NHS trust, while Emis has acquired Medical Imaging, and Northgate has been acquired by Cinven.

EHI PC 500: What comes next?

The future of primary care computing lies in integration with other systems, and in new technologies to let patients contribute to their records, according to experts asked to review the GP IT scene for the 500th edition of EHI Primary Care.

Christmas and New Year are becoming memories, but the diary has only just caught up with the festive features put out by the ‘behind the headlines’ section of NHS Choices. The column battles to apply common sense to some of the maddest health journalism put out by the papers (or, failing that, some understanding of statistics and a basic knowledge of the difference between a rat and a human).

It had a predictably amusing "‘top five’ of daft or misleading stories from 2014. But it also stuck its head out and came up with five (sensible) predictions for the year. Once is that smart watches, such as the Apple Watch, could provide a boost to public health; given Apple’s knack for marketing.

The column gives a little push to NHS Choices’ own Couch to 5k programme; a set of podcasts to get people up and running three miles. Although, it admits, there is always a danger that “you could end up sticking the watch in a drawer, as you are fed up with it nagging you.”

Primary colours

From QOF to patient access and rows over NPfIT, to integrated care, patient access and rows over care.data. The issues covered by EHI Primary Care over ten years have both changed and stayed the same; Sam Sachdeva finds.

“My prediction: health communications will improve and information will kill diseases. My concern: these improvements will be at the expense of caring and privacy.”

“Even if the answer is ‘no’, just tell us and we will plan accordingly.”

A respondent to EHI’s ‘tech fund 2 delay’ survey says any clarity about the outcome of bids to the Integrated Digital Care Technology Fund will be better than none.