Health Select Committee outlines NPfIT inquiry

The House of Commons Health Committee has announced details of what it intends to look into as part of its inquiry into the NHS National Programme of IT.

As EHI reported in November, the Health Select Committee announced in November its intention to undertake an inquiry.

At a meeting this week, the committee said that the NPfIT inquiry will focus on current progress on the development of the NHS care records service and the national data spine – and why delivery of the new systems is up to two years behind schedule.

Included in the committee’s agenda will be what patient information will be held on the new local and national electronic record systems, including whether patients may prevent their personal data being placed on systems and who will have access to locally and nationally held information and under what circumstances.

It will also look at whether patient confidentiality can be adequately protected and how data held on the new systems can and should be used for purposes other than the delivery of care, such as clinical research.

In a press notice they say the enquiry is looking particularly at the development of the electronic patient record.  The committee invites interestd parties to submit written evidence to the inquiry by Friday 16 March.

"Organisations and individuals are invited to submit written evidence. Written evidence should if possible be in Word or rich text format-not PDF format-and sent by e-mail to mailto:healthcomment@parliament.uk. The body of the e-mail must include a contact name, telephone number and postal address. The e-mail should also make clear who the submission is from," it says.

Full information on the terms of evidence is available on the press notice. Evidence sessions are likely to commence after the Easter Recess and a later press notice will give details of these.