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Kat James, joint managing director of Consultant Connect, explains how tech can douse the flames of NHS inefficiencies.
It’s an exciting time for tech in the NHS. Recently, Keir Starmer announced that a new online hospital would be launched by 2027, and Wes Streeting has regularly spoken about the need for a tech revolution in the NHS.
They’re certainly not wrong. One of the biggest challenges we’re facing is connecting the clinical expertise that is dotted around the system. Paramedics and GPs still find it far too difficult to get in touch with hospital consultants to get advice and identify the right pathway, first time. They often find their advice requests stranded on unanswered consultant to-do lists, or they use hospital switchboards, which can take a very long time to connect with the right person (if they even do at all).
In cases like this, primary clinicians are left with little choice but to send patients to hospital. However, it leads to far too many patients being added to waiting lists when they don’t always need to be there.
We know waiting lists have risen for the third consecutive month, and the reflex has been to add clinics, find extra staff and extend hours. It looks decisive, but it rarely creates lasting benefits.
Don’t focus on firefighting
What the NHS really needs is to prevent patients from being unnecessarily added to waiting lists in the first place. Integrating tech platforms throughout the NHS to streamline processes will go a long way in helping this, but focusing solely on firefighting won’t support this.
We need to incentivise NHS Trusts to step back, examine their processes and come up with effective ways to streamline and digitise in a way that works for them long term.
The first step is finding out which tech actually works in the NHS. Technology has the power to fix a lot of things, but robot surgeons and AI won’t fix waiting lists on their own.
Impactful tech solutions in the NHS share three traits.
First, ruthless simplicity. If a tool is not easy to understand and NHS staff can’t learn how to use it in minutes, it will not get adopted. Doctors, paramedics and nurses are under so much pressure that they simply do not have time to learn new complicated tools. The NHS is years behind consumer tech in usability. The answer is not revolution, but simple updates.
Second, immediate clinical payoff. Clinicians need tech that starts generating results immediately; otherwise, they’ll question the point of it. For example, solutions that enable GPs to get instant specialist advice can change a patient’s outcome straight away. Where a GP might previously have sent a patient to a hospital just in case, specialist advice can keep patients out of hospital and get them seen in the right place, first time. That’s an instant impact that’s easy to understand.
Third, the impact spreads on its own. Successful technology starts small, yields results that are easy to communicate, and allows word-of-mouth to do the selling. If the only champions are vendors and comms teams, adoption will stall. When clinicians can point to time saved, referrals avoided, or faster decisions, the system follows.
These principles are what lead to impactful technology in the NHS, but there is a secret fourth ingredient outside of the control of tech providers that’s incredibly important as well: stability.
NHS Trusts are often reluctant to adopt widespread tech changes for the simple reason that policies and budgets are constantly changing.
For example, the Elective Recovery Fund was a very positive initiative that drove tech adoption. However, just as services found their rhythm, the rules changed, and then the support ended. These changes create scepticism and slow investment. Technology needs multi-year certainty to scale.
Stick to it
The government is making the right noises with the 10 Year Health Plan, but it will only have the desired impact if they stick to it. Intent is not delivery. Saying you will go on a diet is not the same as changing your eating habits. If the Government sticks to this policy and gives frontline teams the time and space to redesign systems to make them more efficient, they’re onto a winner.
The key for the NHS to stop firefighting is to have fewer sparks. For medtech providers, this means designing simple, effective tools that can streamline existing processes and create benefits that are easy to understand and communicate to others.
For the government, this means setting the framework and sticking to it. Give systems incentives that reward prevention and collaboration. Give leaders a plan that endures and allows them to adopt the technology that will save them time and effort. Do that, and there’ll be far fewer waiting list fires to put out.
