East Lancashire Hospitals confirms Cerner EPR procurement

East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust is turning its back on more than 30 years of paper records after confirming it has chosen Cerner to supply it with an EPR.

The trust will implement Cerner Millennium in order to pull together a host of clinical and administrative data currently stored in paper files and an outdated patient administration system (PAS).

East Lancashire Hospitals has been replying on the CSC Clinicom/PatientCentre PAS since 1986. The trust, which has around 1,000 inpatient beds and 20,000 outpatient appointments each week, has finally made the jump to an EPR so that its staff can better manage patient demands.

The announcement from East Lancashire Hospitals comes just over two weeks after Digital Health News reported that Cerner had been selected as its EPR supplier, following a news tip.

The evaluation process, which began in October last year and involved 50 senior clinicians and IT, saw Cerner Millennium vying for space amongst four other EPR suppliers.

The procurement was signed off by the ELHT Board in December. The trust said it was now working with Cerner to develop “a full business case for the implementation Cerner Millennium.”

Financial details were not disclosed.

Tom Newton, the trust’s chief clinical information officer, said: “Much more than a computer system, Cerner Millennium will transform the way our clinical staff work, making sense of busy, complex health services, analysing information in clever ways and helping to manage many every-day tasks.”

“This system will not only help to treat patients more effectively by giving healthcare staff easier access to up-to-date information, it will also use this information to improve care, and give healthcare staff the tools needed to be safer and more efficient”.

According to the Digital Health Intelligence database, the Cerner Millennium EPR is in use by 22 NHS trusts in England, including six in the north of the country.

The implementation of an EPR at East Lancashire Hospitals formulates part of its 2016-2021 informatics strategy, which will eventually see other digital solutions including e-whiteboards and video conferencing brought into the fold.

ELHT director of finance Jonathan Wood, said: “Cerner’s EPR, selected by senior clinicians at the Trust, will firmly place East Lancashire Hospitals at the forefront of NHS health informatics and enable us to introduce further innovation for the benefits of staff and patients.”

Earlier this month, the trust began using new wearable technology designed to prevent falls in older people by measuring their mobility.