Bath switches on Cerner Millennium

Bath's baths

Royal United Hospital Bath NHS Trust has switched on Cerner Millennium; becoming the first of three ‘greenfield’ sites to get the system under a new delivery model.

The trust went live over the weekend, meeting its planned July go-live date. The new system was provided under the auspices of BT as part of the National Programme for IT in the NHS.

The implementation comes exactly three years later than a planned 2008 implementation from Fujitsu, which was axed after Fujitsu's local service provider deal was terminated.

Early indications are that the go-live has been positive. The trust’s website and phone system asked visitors to be patient with any delays experienced as staff got new to the new computer system: “staff are getting used to a new computer system so it may take a little longer”.

The implementation is understood to have occurred across the trust and to include patient administration and Cerner’s Surginet theatre management system. The Cerner products replace an ageing TDS patient administration system and Orsos theatre system.

In a statement to eHealth Insider, the trust said: “We can confirm that the new Cerner Millennium IT system successfully went live on Friday 29 July – as planned – at Royal United Hospital Bath NHS Trust.

"BT and Cerner worked closely with the trust and the Southern Programme for IT on the implementation over the past year – a complex and major change management programme.”

The trust added it was “pleased with the way the phased introduction has gone so far."

Bath is the ninth NHS trust in the South of England to take Cerner Millennium under the £12 billion NPfIT; although one trust has subsequently switched off the system after after merging with a neighbour.

Bath is also the first of three 'greenfield' sites in the South of England to receive Millennium as part of a £542m contract awarded to BT in April 2010.

The other two ‘greenfield’ trusts are North Bristol and Oxford Radcliffe, both of which say they will go-live before the end of the calendar year. All three implementations will use a new Cerner delivery model.

EHI understands that Oxford Radcliffe hopes to go live with its Cerner implementation in mid-November.