The Health Foundation's response to 'Liberating the NHS: An Information Revolution'

Date: January 2011

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The Health Foundation's response to 'Liberating the NHS: An Information Revolution'

Background

In the White Paper, Equity and Excellence: Liberating the NHS', the government announced its intention to bring about an NHS information revolution.

The subsequent consultation, Liberating the NHS: an information revolution was published on 18 October 2010. The paper articulates the government’s vision of liberating information and transforming the way information is collected, analysed and used by the NHS and adult social care services. 

The Health Foundation's response

The Health Foundation is supportive of the government’s vision to liberate information to serve patients and the public and improve the use of information throughout the care system.

Through our research and our experience of supporting improvement programmes throughout the NHS, we know that information and data are active tools in quality improvement and that poor or incomplete information is a major barrier to the implementation of effective improvement interventions.

However, the Health Foundation believes that the proposals in 'An Information Revolution' should be considered as part of a much wider agenda for them to realise their potential. This agenda includes changing the relationship between patients and health services and a new model of professionalism for a modern health service.

We caution that achieving the aspirations laid out in 'An Information Revolution' will require time, support and local leadership. Information liberation within the NHS is more likely to be evolutionary rather than revolutionary. The information strategy should set the right policy framework for this development to happen at a local level.