A Black Book survey finds that clinicians and hospital staff are unhappy with Electronic Health Record systems and 100% agree on the need to prioritise funding.
Clinicians and hospital staff across the NHS in Scotland, England, and Wales are unhappy with Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems according to independent healthcare IT research group Black Book Market Research.
The survey highlights “the critical need for actionable strategies to modernise, streamline, and improve EHR systems across the board,” said Doug Brown, founder of Black Book Research.
Every IT respondent agreed on the need to prioritise funding to close digital maturity gaps. Without adequate investment in modern IT infrastructure, the NHS risks “falling further behind in delivering efficient, technology-driven care” the report says.
The survey found (90%) that there was a need to revamp outdated NHS IT infrastructure and to replace it with modern, efficient platforms to mitigate productivity losses and reduce inefficiency.
The clinical need for this is significant. The survey found that outdated IT infrastructure results in productivity losses equivalent to hiring 8,000 additional doctors annually – an issue that was highlighted by 90% of IT respondents.
Hand-in hand with this was the near unanimous (99%) call for the service to learn from previous EHR implementation failures. Transparency, rigor, and alignment with NHS priorities-particularly data security-were cited as essential for future procurement success.
Elevating standards
Another was need to elevate usability standards. User dissatisfaction, particularly among frontline clinicians, was raised by nearly 79% of survey participants who called for the adoption of user-centric EHR technology. The issue is even more significant for emergency staff, 96% of whom identified current systems as a “major hindrance” to efficient care delivery.
At the same time, a familiar complaint (91%) was the desire to foster interoperability within the NHS. Chief information officers and IT leaders want vendor-neutral, standards-based platforms to facilitate seamless data sharing.
The survey drew on insights from the responses of 820 UK clinicians, technical staff, and administrators.
