The NHS’s IT project has hit yet more criticism. The BMA’s Annual Conference has hit out against the Choose and Book system. Choose and Book is the patient booking and referral system. It was one of the first systems to go live and has gradually rolled out over the past year or so. I remember the early versions didn’t even have the facility to specify left or right in operations! That was just one of the problems.
To be fair, I’m sure they’ve ironed out a lot of the issues from the early versions. But the reaction of the BMA clearly shows that it still doesn’t meet expectations. As far as the whole CfH project is going this was one the better components! In my opinion the whole system is over complicated. Having worked integrating with it, its clear why there are so many issues and why its seems to be a money pit.
But we are in the 21st century and the logical progression is to a computer based system. Its just this one has been run badly from day one. I guess I’ll follow the advice of a senior person there. If you are having an operation, mark where you are having it clearly in black marker!
