The NHS faces a daunting challenge in supporting the population with limited resources, staff, and infrastructure. Digital technology offers a compelling solution to meet present and future needs.
While there is much more to do to unlock the potential of digital technologies, there are many fantastic examples of digital partnerships across the UK. These partnerships are having a significant impact on both services and patients. We are pleased to announce that the DHC is partnering with the TEC Services Association (TSA) to highlight some of this best practice usage of digital across the UK.
For the past three months, the DHC and TSA have been working together to understand how Integrated Care Systems (ICS) intend to leverage technology and enhance their services to improve outcomes for the people using them.
The catalyst for this journey stemmed from the Health and Care Act 2022, which mandated all 42 Integrated Care Partnerships (ICPs) to create and publicise integrated care strategies for their systems. As per the directive, by June 30th 2023, the related ICBs were required to generate a comprehensive five-year Joint Forward Plan (JFP) outlining their proposals to serve their populations’ needs.
Through a carefully structured process, TSA and DHC undertook the analysis of the available integrated care strategies, vetting them against certain criteria aimed at identifying systems that strategically plan to increase their use of technology.
We will be sharing the initial findings and key messages from this project in the forthcoming weeks. We will also be working with a select group of ICBs to delve into how these systems have seamlessly integrated digital technology into their strategies and service models, with a focus on understanding the role of co-production in this process.
Following this dialogue, TSA and DHC will publish a short paper detailing the findings and valuable insights gained from this partnership, setting a beacon for other systems to follow. We look forward to sharing more information in the coming weeks.
For more information about the project, the DHC or our members, please contact: contact@digitalhealthcarecouncil.co.uk