iSoft completes Welsh lab system upgrade

iSoft has completed an upgrade of laboratory information systems at nine NHS trusts in Wales, as part of a £1m contract.

The contract for the technology refresh was agreed in September 2007 and includes iSoft’s latest i.Laboratory TP application, providing an InterSystems Caché environment.

It ensures that all NHS trusts in Wales will run the same version of i.Laboratory TP as North East Wales NHS Trust and Gwent Healthcare NHS Trust, which received upgrades last year under an existing contract.

Ceredigion and Mid Wales NHS Trust this week became the final trust to be upgraded. An iSoft spokesperson told E-Health Insider: “The benefits the nine trusts will receive include greater resilience.

“Previously, the trusts were running the application on single servers. Now, high availability clustering technology provides greater resilience and a more reliable service, leading to a faster turnaround of test results.”

Paul Richards, managing director of iSoft UK and Ireland, added: “Very close cooperation between iSoft and staff at each trust enabled us to complete this project to the agreed schedule and consistently hit the deadlines for each trust within the overall programme.”

North West Wales NHS Trust was one of the first to be upgraded. The trust’s laboratory systems manager, Ian Kilbourn, said: “We are now able to gather information in minutes rather than hours and the whole system is much more robust, with instant screen refresh.

“Administrative tasks have been streamlined and we have a degree of resilience not seen before, which is vital for a system that is an essential component for the clinical care of patients.”

The technology refresh upgrades systems originally installed in the 1990s. The deal was negotiated by Informing Healthcare, the Welsh Assembly government programme set up to improve patient care through better use of information and IT.

The nine NHS trusts to receive upgrades are: Abertawe Bro Morgannwg, Conwy and Denbighshire, Cardiff and Vale, Carmarthenshire, Ceredigion, North Glamorgan, North West Wales, Pembrokeshire and Derwen, and Pontypridd & Rhondda.

Links

iSoft

Informing Healthcare