NHS says Lorenzo won’t be complete until 2016

20 May 2008

North West Strategic Health Authority says it does not expect full installation of the strategic Lorenzo electronic patient record software until 2016, a year later the date set out in last week’s National Audit Office report.

A board paper from the SHA says a new contract between CfH/NHS and local service provider (LSP) CSC is due to be signed that will stretch out deployment dates into 2016.

First meant to be delivered at the end of 2004 Lorenzo is already running four years late. Last week’s NAO report on the NPfIT programme said delivery of the late-running software to NHS trusts is not exepcted to be completed until 2015. The NAO report said delivery by the end of 2015 would represent a four-to-five year delay.

However, the NAO report said repeated past delays raised questions over the latest roll-out timetable. “There is considerable uncertainty about when the care records system will be fully deployed and working across the country.”

The extent of this uncertainty is highlighted in the North West SHA paper. “Included within the Project Agreement (contract) is a revised plan for deployment of the LSP up to 2016,” states the SHA Board paper from May 2008.

The same paper goes on to state that the forthcoming Swindells Review of NHS informatics “is expected to give the NHS more flexibility to implement interim solutions where LSP offerings are not available or not fit for purpose.”

Under development by iSoft the Lorenzo software, installed by CSC, is the main care records service (CSR) software due to be delivered to three-fifths of the NHS in England under the £12.7 billion NHS IT programme.

The report warned the timeframe of current Lorenzo roll-out plans: three pilots in summer 2008, with full roll-out from autumn 2008, “may prove over-ambitious”.

One of the three pilots to be first to receive Lorenzo in a limited installation is due to be Morecombe Bay, which the North West SHA board paper says is due to happen on 16 June. “If Morecombe Bay maintains this date they will be the first deployment of Lorenzo in the country.”

Though the CSC/CfH contract reset which establishes the new dates, was due to have been signed by 6 May, E-Health Insider has learned this deadline has now passed unmet.

Link

NAO says care records delayed until 2015

Reader's Comments

How long?

20 May 08 10:53

Its hard to believe that anyone would buy technology with a lead-time of 12 years.

The clock ticks....

jase_jackson@hotmail.com

20 May 08 12:26

Have to agree.

Any software delivered on those time scales, whilst one hopes is stable, cannot offer the fuctionality & flexibility of the latest solutions. Whilst patient, political and reporting requirements expand and become more complex the developers are constantly trying to hit a moving target. I don't envy being in CSC's position or Trusts having to move back to inferior (in terms of functionality) solutions.

planning event horizon

20 May 08 12:36

Did I read this right? CSC/CFH & NW SHA is trying to plan what IT systems to deploy in eight years time? After 2 or 3 general elections? As far away as the Olympic games after the one after next?

So, in the time it takes to choose a country, build a medium size town and a couple of dozen stadiums, railways, roads, medical facilities, etc, etc, etc, and run a few thousand sporting events for an audience of a few billion we MIGHT have finished LSP deployments?

Of course the London games are only 4 years away and due to cost a mere £9bn. I wonder what Seb Coe is doing in 2013?

Will Foundation Trusts go it alone?

20 May 08 12:53

By 2016 most, if not all, English NHS Trusts will be foundation trusts and will be able to procure their own clinical/reporting software based on their own specific needs. This may involve paying for it themselves instead of getting it "free" but I think most trusts will be forced to take this option to remain viable as a "safe, effective and financially stable business".

Event Horizon - or Black Hole?

20 May 08 16:19

Those of us with intimate knowledge of LORENZO and iSOFT already know this....I honestly do not know how they are getting away with it?

Am i being stupid?

21 May 08 08:38

am i being stupid thinking that this whole programme is being made far more complicated than it actually is?

was any real consultation done on the project? Have the staff actually got their requirements in place? was any time taken to actually look at the sensible cost effective way of managing this project delivery rather than the most flashy and confusing to the tax payer (what they dont understand they cant complain about)??

From someone who works in independant healthcare IT, and whose team in 3.5 years has designed and built a fully functioning electronic care record that does what THE STAFF need it to do, for multiples sites in wide reaching locations, with nowhere even close to the same mind blowing budget, and with only tiny development resources - i find the whole thing quite ridiculous and often frustrating!

Granted, many of the modules required to be delivered by Lorenzo and other solutions would be irrelevant to our services, but the fact remains that a simple "what would you need/like it to do?" exercise followed by regular user testing and progression - maybe even smaller releases of major process altering systems - would have done the trick...

Internet based communications and IT in general has progressed through the use of well documented standards to provide toolkits and methodologies to allow disparate systems to interact securely and efficiently without the need for cumbersome infrastructure and procedures that can only restrict practice and put patients at risk!

it is little wonder that some trusts have opted out and chosen solutions that work for them and that are fit for purpose, procured outside of the programme - that in itself is cause to stop and examine the roots of the project deliverables.

Someone needs to stop this programme and get back to the initial goals and re-evaluate the most practical and operationally sound method of reaching them.

Moving targets? I dont think anybody actually knows what the targets look like - which surely makes it impossible to hit at all?