CSP: more to do on digitisation of the NHS

The Panel’s evaluation covers nine government commitments related to the digitisation of the NHS across four main policy areas, including care of patients and service users; health of the population; cost and efficiency of care and workforce literacy and the digital workforce.  

CSP health informatics lead Euan McComiskie along with CSP member Anna Rubio attended a virtual event in September to share evidence and their perspectives with members of the Panel. 

In its submission, the CSP has recommended:  

• Government commitments must be mindful of all sectors and professions in health and social care, with recommendations inclusive of all users 

• Government-selected expert panels should represent the workforce that they are supposed to serve. They should not be dominated by clinicians from one profession (i.e. medicine) at the expense of other (e.g. nurses, midwives, AHPs including physiotherapists, pharmacists etc.) 

• Funding to support implementation of basic digital and data infrastructure is essential to meet even the simplest of commitments 

• Investment in the current workforce is essential to overcome the challenges and barriers to digitisation in the NHS 

• Investment must be accessible to all sectors and not further emphasise growing budget gaps 

• Commitments must be specific, measurable, achievable, and realistic. 

Commenting on the Panel’s evaluation of the government’s progress on its commitments related to the digitisation of the NHS, Euan McComiskie, health informatics lead at the CSP, said:  

‘The CSP and our members have been involved with digitisation of the NHS for several years, so we had a range of successes to share with the Panel.  

‘However, there continue to be significant barriers and challenges to normalising digital as part of physiotherapy services so there is clearly more to do to overcome these.  

‘National policy support would enhance work to overcome these challenges and we welcome future opportunities to work with the Panel to discuss such support, and hope to include this alongside our activity with the Physiotherapy Health Informatics Strategy (PHIS).’ 

It is one of the latest evaluations undertaken by the panel in its broader evaluation of progress by the government across a range of commitments it has made in relation to health and social care.  

The Health and Social Care Committee (HSCC) established the panel – independent of the Committee and with a mandate to conduct impartial evaluations – to support its scrutiny of the government’s commitments in health and social care policy in 2020.