EHealth insider has sent an open letter to health secretary Andrew Lansley, urging him to include a prominent role for chief clinical information officers in the forthcoming NHS information strategy.
The open letter, endorsed by seven of the royal medical colleges, advises the health secretary of the strong momentum that is building for the need to develop CCIOs as local clinical information champions across the NHS.
The EHI CCIO Campaign was launched last June, in conjunction with the Royal College of Physicians and BCS - The Chartered Institute for IT.
Ten royal medical colleges have backed the campaign, while more than 50 suppliers and dozens of individuals have signed an online petition in support of it.
Six NHS trusts have appointed CCIOs and further appointments are expected over the coming months.
To take forward the objectives of the EHI CCIO Campaign, EHI is now working with campaign supporters and partners to establish a CCIO Leaders Network, to be delivered through a programme of events and an online professional network.
The CCIO Leaders Network will be officially launched on 8 March by health secretary Andrew Lansley at a launch event being run by EHI in partnership with the Royal College of Physicians.
The open letter, signed by EHI editor Jon Hoeksma, advises: “The CCIO role has quickly become well recognised within the NHS and synonymous with the ambition of developing a wide range of clinical information leaders.”
Dr Rhidian Bramley, the CCIO and director of clinical radiology at The Christie NHS Foundation Trust told EHI in an interview that he took on the title to support the campaign.
“I was keen to use the title to support the campaign because I believe local clinical leadership in IT can significantly improve patient care and services, and help audit outcomes,” he said.
The royal medical colleges that have so far backed the campaign are: The Royal College of Surgeons, Royal College of Physicians, Royal College of Nursing, Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, Royal College of Psychiatrists, Royal College of Midwives, Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, Royal College of Anaesthetists, Royal College of Radiologists and Royal College of Ophthalmologists.
The letter advises that the campaign’s supporters “recognise that improving the quality of information in the NHS - and making it available to clinicians, patients, commissioners and providers in a transparent and efficient manner - will be a critical tool in improving the quality of patient care.”
It also says that encouraging the development of CCIOs “would build on the recommendations made by the NHS Future Forum in January about the need to champion a cultural shift on the approach to information throughout the NHS…”
The Department of Health ran a consultation on an information strategy to support the ‘Liberating the NHS’ reforms towards the end of 2010. However, the information strategy that was supposed to follow the ‘Information Revolution’ consultation has never appeared.
The second report of the NHS Future Forum, which focused on information issues, said it would be published by April. The January report argued that the barriers in the way of an information revolution were more cultural than technological, and called for change to be “championed” at every level.
Links:
Open letter to health secretary Andrew Lansley
© 2012 EHealth Media.
The BCS Primary Health Care Specialist Group are delighted to back the EHI call for clinical engagement at board level, their CCIO campaign. We have long pushed for recognition that health informatics is now an essential part of health care, and needs top level clinical involvement.
Through our work with the NHS we recognise that it is fundamentally important for IT projects to be clinically driven from the outset to ensure their success, and that’s why BT is delighted to support E-Health Insider’s campaign. Never before has there been a better time for IT to really make a difference to the NHS and the creation of this new role will ensure IT remains high on the agenda and clinically led.
It's blindingly obvious that one is needed.
Simples
The Royal College of Anaesthetists is happy to endorse the campaign for Chief Clinical Information Officers in NHS Trusts. In an environment of growing innovation for information generation in the healthcare environment, it is vital that integration of systems and coordination of effort is seen as paramount to ensure good communication and appropriate data security – the CCIO role will be vital to provide professional management and patient reassurance.
Clinical leadership of IT is essential to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past and bring healthcare IT into the 21st century.
Delighted to see this campaign receive the level of support it so richly deserves from so many of the Royal Colleges and other professional groups. The change that the campaign will hopefully bring about is long overdue. Well done to EHI for organising.For what it%u219s worth, as a public health doctor and registered health informatician, I fully support the campaign.Better intelligence = better decisions = better healthDr Brendan O%u219BrienUKCHIP Level 3
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Large scale IT projects continue to fail to realise their full potential and return on investment more often than not because clinic
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