BT initially announced that it had secured a 10-year contract, worth £620 million, to design, deliver and manage a national patient record database and transactional messaging service for the NHS Care Records Service.
In a separate news release, the telecoms group also revealed that it had been granted a 10-year, £996 million deal to design, deliver and operate integrated local systems for the London care community.
The contracts are part of a UK program to improve patient record keeping, which will enable the health service to record and exchange patient information electronically without duplicating files. BT also saw the victories as evidence of the changing face of the company.
The database will hold electronic summary patient records. These secure records will be shared nationally with clinicians and medical practitioners dependent on their access authority. Patients will no longer be required to repeat information about their medical history at different stages of the care process.
Although BT is set to work with other organizations on both deals, the company is the prime contractor and will deliver and operate the services through Syntegra – its systems integration subsidiary.
We are delighted to have been chosen by the NHS to deliver a key part of the National Programme for IT, one of the biggest and most ambitious healthcare IT projects in the world, explained Sir Christopher Bland, BT’s Chairman.
The technology in our solution and our expertise will help to provide real benefits to NHS patients and staff. It will improve the working lives of nurses and doctors, offering easy and secure access to patient records, added Mr Bland, in his comments to the press.
