New NHS Computer System Slammed As 'Incredibly Disappointing'

A new NHS computerised medical system has been slammed by a hospital boss as "incredibly disappointing".

Andrew Way, Chief Executive of the Royal free Hospital in London, said problems with the e-records scheme had cost £10 million and meant fewer patients were seen after the hospital began trialling the system last summer.

Mr Way, who said the scheme caused "heartache and hard work", added he had to employ an additional 40 administrative staff just to handle the extra workload.

He also said a further £6 million was effectively lost because fewer patients and problems with the system meant the hospital was unable to bill other parts of the NHS for work carried out.

The National Programme for IT (NPfIT) - restricted to England - aims to create a centralised medical records system for 50 million patients in England at a cost of more than £12 billion.

Mr Way told the BBC: "I think it is very disappointing that the work we had to do as a trust has caused our staff so much heartache and hard work.

"Many of the medical staff are incredibly disappointed with what we have got.

"I have personally apologised for the decision to implement the system before we were really clear about what we were going to receive. I had been led to believe it would all work."

Prime Minister Gordon Brown defended the NHS IT project at a meeting of Commons select committee chairmen on Thursday.

He said: "For all the problems that a huge project like that has created, you cannot say that that is not an advance."

A Department of Health spokesman added: "Many elements of the programme are complete, and patients and clinicians are now beginning to see the benefits these systems bring to improve patient care.

"We are learning lessons from the deployment at the Royal Free of the Cerner Millennium (the new computer system), which now has an effective patient record system, and we expect these lessons to help us improve further deployments."

(JM/BMcC)