South Warwickshire authorises shared smartcard use
South Warwickshire General Hospitals NHS Trust has confirmed that its board has agreed that clinicians working in part of its A&E Department can share smartcards to access patient records. The trust passed the policy after deciding that the lengthy log-in times, averaging 60-90 seconds, it takes staff to log-on to the hospital’s new patient administration […]
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‘Nurse bots’ to be developed by 2010
The European Union is funding scientists to develop ‘nurse bots’, mechanised robots designed to perform basic tasks such as mopping up spillages, taking messages and guiding visitors to hospital beds. It is hoped that in the future teams of bots working together may be used to help ease pressure on hospitals and free staff to spend […]
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The next wave
Ben Toth explains how the user’s relationship with the internet is changing, in the first of two articles on healthcare and Web 2.0.
Feature
Disk imaging for largest NI community trust
The largest community trust in Northern Ireland, Homefirst Community Health and Social Services Trust, has installed the Universal Imaging Utility (UIU) software distribution system from Big Bang LLC. Homefirst, which covers 100 health and social care facilities, 300,000 people and employs 5000 staff, installed the software to make it easier to distribute patches and updates […]
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Human change the ‘greatest challenge’ for NHS IT
Achieving changes in human processes to accommodate the IT revolution is perhaps the greatest challenge to the successful implementation of improvements in the quality and efficiency of healthcare, senior NHS figures say in an article published this week. Otherwise, manual processes will simply be replaced with digital ones, they warn. In a commentary article in the Journal of the […]
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Milton Keynes implements WinPath pathology system
Milton Keynes General NHS Trust has announced that it has gone live with the WinPath pathology system from software developers CliniSys. The trust’s previous pathology system, OPUS from Supporta plc, needed replacing urgently because Milton Keynes was the only user remaining and there were concerns over ongoing support, development, and hardware issues. The new WinPath system went first live […]
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Hounslow PCT launches remote access
Network integration specialist Scalable Networks has teamed up with Hounslow Primary Care Trust to set up a new home and roaming access service for 700 staff. The system has been set up to prepare the trust for its implementation of CSE-Servelec’s web-based Electronic Care Record system, RiO, at the end of next month. RiO will allow […]
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Carmarthenshire buys new asset management software
Carmarthenshire NHS Trust is set to invest over £80,000 in a new system to better track and manage its IT hardware and software, to improve helpdesk services and audits of IT resources. The trust will install UK public sector software specialists, Real Asset Management’s (RAM) Series4000, a suite of fixed asset software modules. The new […]
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Implementation dates for hospitals continue to slip
An investigation by E-Health Insider has found that two-thirds of the 22 NHS acute trusts that were meant to be receiving a replacement patient administration system by the end of October say they will not hit the target. In late June NHS Connecting for Health and its local service providers told Richard Bacon MP, a […]
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CfH seeks acute trust for blood barcoding pilot
NHS Connecting for Health and the National Patient Safety Agency have announced they are looking for an acute trust to pilot IT specifications for electronic blood tracking. A small, non-teaching hospital trust is sought for the pilot, which will begin in March 2007, to evaluate the IT guidelines developed by the NPSA. The NPSA’s aim […]
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