Cerner problems 'reported before NOC go-live'

Tags: Cerner Information iS London Newham Safety

12 Dec 2006

A problem with appointment bookings that hit Nuffield Orthopaedic Hospital when it went live with its new Cerner system had been reported previously by a London hospital, according to a television report.

The problem resulted in some patients not receiving appointments and others presenting when the hospital was not expecting them. It also resulted in the recording of a Serious Untoward Incident – an official notice of a failure that could disrupt patient care.

An investigation by Channel 4 and Computer Weekly screen last night found that a report had been written by consultants, Tribal Secta, about similar experiences at Newham Hospital, east London.

The programme makers claim the report had been submitted to the authorities a month before Nuffield Orthopaedic Hospital (NOC) in Oxford went live with the system and included a recommendation that its findings should be shared. NOC say they did not see it.

Connecting for Health said the agency did not know about the report specifically but added that much learning and experience gained at Newham was incorporated into the planning for the NOC deployment.

It said the system was thoroughly reviewed before implementation and NOC staff visited Newham. The new system was now working well at the NOC.

Professor Martyn Thomas, visiting professor in software engineering at Oxford University, told the programme the finding was “alarming.”

“If there are known problems they should be communicated very rapidly to other users of the system,” said Professor Thomas, who is a member of the group of 23 academics that has raised questions about the National Programme for IT, of which the NOC implementation was part.

He added that where there were safety hazards it was particularly incumbent on people involved to make sure the defect information and fixes were made available to all users of the system.

Readers Comments

More spin and denial

12 Dec 06 16:35

If the NOC is working well why arn't more Trusts in the Southern Cluster now using the system. Do CFH spokespersons not realise that the more denial the greater the loss in credibility. We all know that this is a tough agenda but hiding how tough it is, not admitting what has gone wrong and more importantly what has been learned, the on-going lack of honest and detailed communications are just widening the gulf between CFH and the sharp end of the NHS.

If this was evidence based medicine - I think an alternative treament regime would be in place by now - to ensure further subjects were not harmed by the CFH quackery.

airtime?

13 Dec 06 17:26

Anybody any ideas when this might be aired? on C4?

you missed it but.....

13 Dec 06 23:38

its available on C4 site-worth watching

Time Line

14 Dec 06 08:30

Why is it that no one - not in your report or on the C4 news program - reporting on events at the NOC mentioned that it happened a year ago? or mentioned the hospitals that have since gone live without this problem?

Time Line

14 Dec 06 08:30

Time Line

14 Dec 06 14:12

Which ones were those exactly - Weston perhaps? But then, perhaps not.

But...

14 Dec 06 17:26

The point isn't that the other sites didn't have the problem - but that it was known about and not communicated to NOC. Patient care suffered because of this. Why was it not communicated? What has been put in place to make sure issues like this are communicated in future to people who need to know?

We aren't talking about a system where an issue can be fixed later but one where patients weren't treated in a timely fashion - causing unnecessary stress and concern to them.

We all make mistakes - but lets make sure that later sites learn from the earlier ones.... past performance in this case is an indicator of future performance if we don't work out what happened and why and fix it!

frying pan and fire

18 Dec 06 15:13

The selection process when it was decided that IDX didn't pass muster for Southern was somewhat lacking in my view. But more importantly, they made the same mistakes with another inappropriate system rather than address the underlying problems; that systems suited for single organisations are being shoehorned into serving many, and that local circumstances, and autonomy of configuration for a Trust could easily be sacrificed for the greater good of ruthless standardisation.

There were significant problems for Newnham and Homiton on Reporting as well as data conversion, and there still are. I do recall this being an issue with the TDS system too - ahh Wessex RISP, learned all the lessons from that one then.