Digitising NHS and adult social care services across the UK will require an estimated £21 billion over the next 5 years, according to new research published by the Health Foundation. Of this total figure, £14.75bn is for England.
The independent charity commissioned PA Consulting to assess the investment needed to achieve existing ambitions for digitisation. These include putting in place infrastructure such as electronic patient records, cloud storage, cyber security and Wi-Fi, along with the skills and capabilities to use it effectively.
This research is published ahead of the forthcoming Spending Review and the 10 Year Health Plan which will set out the government’s plans to shift the NHS from ‘analogue to digital’.
In the absence of a publicly available official figure for the cost of existing commitments to digitise the NHS and adult social care, this research is the first evidence-based attempt to provide such an estimate.
Estimated cost
What the money will need to be spent on
£8bn capital spending (of which £5bn is for England)
Hardware, software, electronic patient records and wider infrastructure
£3bn one-off revenue spending (of which £2.25bn is for England)
Planning, initial education and training, implementation of new technologies, transition from old systems
£2bn recurring annual revenue spending (of which £1.5bn per annum is for England) over 5 years
Ongoing training, software subscriptions, maintenance, improvement and optimisation
Debates about digitisation often assume the resources required will be capital spending on hardware and infrastructure costs. But these findings highlight the importance of revenue spending to support implementation, pay for software subscriptions, maintenance, optimisation and other ongoing costs, and, crucially, invest in training and development for the staff using it. And it is important to note that recurring costs will be ongoing beyond the 5-year period that was the focus of this research.
The research also highlights important gaps in publicly available information on the costs and benefits of digitisation.
As part of this research, the Health Foundation has set out three key actions for government and policymakers across the UK, to ensure the NHS and social care services can meet ambitions for digitisation:
Set a clear, transformative and durable vision for digitisation in health and social care
Support the vision for digitisation with the required funding
Develop a plan for realising the benefits of digitisation – including higher quality care, better patient experience, better staff experience and improved productivity.
Director of Innovation and Improvement at the Health Foundation, Dr Malte Gerhold, said: “Ministers have repeatedly stressed the need for health and care services to move from analogue to digital. Our independently commissioned research finds that to achieve the government’s ambitions to digitise health and social care, significant spending will be needed over the next 5 years and beyond.”
“But direct investment in technology alone is not sufficient. The government must fund the change not just the tech. This means investing in and planning for implementation and change to genuinely realise the benefits of digitisation for patients and staff.”
