Suffolk and North East Essex ICS work with Better on care planning platform

Suffolk and North East Essex Integrated Care System (ICS) has collaborated with openEHR platform provider, Better, for a pilot which targets patients with life limiting conditions.

The working proof of concept for an integrated care planning platform, named Advanced Care Platform, will significantly reduce the amount of paper being used across the ICS and make it easier for care plans to be shared amongst those who need sight of them.

The pilot is now being trialled within the West Suffolk Alliance, and if successful, it’s hoped the technology will provide a solution to trusted assessment and operational communication challenges.

The platform gives real-time access to a single set of information focused on specific health and care needs to patients with life limiting conditions, their families, carers and support services. According to Suffolk and North East Essex ICS “it places the person at the centre of their care plan”.

Barbara Gale, chief executive of St Nicholas Care, which is part of the Alliance, said: “For many years people have expressed the problems of having to repeat their story to different professionals about what is important to them and what they might wish to happen if they were dying. This project offers a solution to that problem and could play a vital role in improving the quality of care at such a difficult time in people’s lives.”

It is the first UK implementation of a platform that can facilitate care coordination, joining up expertise and knowledge of open standards across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Better applied its open health data platform and low code tools to support clinicians with the rapid build, which was implemented in 12 weeks.

Matthew Cox, managing director for Better UK and Ireland, added: “The key to success of the project was the fantastic engagement right across the region led by the clinical teams and underpinned by core principles of an open platform approach with the separation of data from the application. With our low code tools and health data platform, this approach allowed the project team to rapidly prototype and evolve the solution, learning and refining without the need for multiple integration of data from different existing systems.”

The solution was integrated with the GP electronic health records (EHR) EMIS and SystmOne by CARE IS, while Cohesion Medical developed the patient app enabling instant and secure access for users to add their wishes into the clinical record.

Kate Walker, digital programme director at Suffolk and North East Essex ICS, said: “The possibility of a single digital record that is accessible by whoever needs to see it, enabling granular access rights as required by their role, and with secure operation over NHS or public facing internet has alluded IT systems.  This programme demonstrates this capability and presents opportunities with potential futures benefits across health and care.”

At the end of last year, Better was awarded a £3.1million contract to provide a shared care solution for five Clinical Commissioning Groups in London.