Department of Health Minister John Hutton yesterday announced that on 1 April 2005 the National Programme for IT will become an agency of the Department of Health and will be re-named Connecting for Health.
Richard Granger will become Chief Executive and Senior Responsible Officer for Programme and Systems Delivery. He remains Director General for IT. John Bacon, Department of Health Group Director for Delivery, becomes overarching Senior Responsible Officer for all workstreams for the programme. Both Richard Granger and John Bacon continue to report to the NHS Chief Executive, Sir Nigel Crisp. The NHS National Programme for IT goals include:
- creating an NHS Care Records Service to improve the sharing of consenting patients' records across the NHS
- making it easier and faster for GPs and other primary care staff to book hospital appointments for patients
- providing a system for electronic transmission of prescriptions
- ensuring that the IT infrastructure can meet NHS needs now and in the future
Quelle: Publictechnology, 24.03.2005
