The Department of Health and Social Care has published a new health in data strategy Data Saves Lives: Reshaping Health and Social Care with Data
Millions of patients will benefit from faster, more innovative treatment and diagnosis following publication of a new data strategy for health and social care.
Our new data in health strategy - Data Saves Lives: Reshaping Health and Social Care with Data, published today (Monday 13), focuses on seven principles to harness the data driven power and innovation seen during the pandemic to drive transformation in health and care, creating a secure and privacy preserving system which delivers for both patients and professionals.
The strategy sets out ambitious reforms for the health and care sector, transforming the way data is used to drive breakthroughs and efficiencies, helping to tackle the Covid backlog and create a system fit for the future.
Launching the strategy at London Tech Week’s HealthTech Summit, Health and Social Care Secretary Sajid Javid is expected to say:
The principles set out in the data strategy are:
To give patients greater confidence than ever that their personal information is safe, Secure Data Environments will be made the default for NHS and adult social care organisations to provide access to de-identified data for research. This means data linked to an individual will never leave a secure server, and can only be used for agreed research purposes.
Following a £200 million investment, Trusted Research Environments (TREs) – a form of Secure Data Environments – will be established to better enable researchers to securely access linked NHS data while maintaining the highest levels of privacy and security.
This will enable the NHS to deliver cutting-edge life-saving treatments and diagnosis to patients faster through clinical trials and facilitate more diverse and inclusive research to tackle entrenched health inequalities, which will in turn allow the NHS to work through the Covid backlog at a faster pace.
Speaking at the HealthTech summit, Health and Social Care Secretary Sajid Javid is expected to say:
The data strategy also contains key commitments to give patients greater access to and control over their data including by simplifying the opt out processes for data sharing and improving access to GP records in the NHS App by giving patients access to their latest health information by November 2022. Further improvements, including being able to more easily request historic information including diagnosis, blood test results and immunisations will be made available by December 2023.
The public will also be consulted on a new “data pact” which will set out how the healthcare system will use patient data, and what the public has the right to expect.
Use of the NHS App has boomed throughout the pandemic. 28 million users already have ability to access their data and services and statistics show in April alone, the NHS App enabled 1.7 million patients to order repeat prescriptions, 150,000 primary care appointments were managed and five million people viewed their GP record, saving vital clinician time.
With an ambition for the NHS App to be a one stop shop for health needs, the strategy commits to a target of 75% of the adult population to be registered to use the NHS App by March 2024.
Speaking at the HealthTech summit, Health and Social Care Secretary Sajid Javid is also expected to say:
Better use of data is central to the government’s mission to integrate health and social care. Following a £150 million funding commitment to drive rapid digitisation in the adult social care sector, the strategy outlines how integrated care records will enable smoother transitions between NHS services and social care, including quicker discharge from hospital freeing up valuable space.
Currently only 45% of social care providers use a digital social care record, and 23% of care home staff can not access the internet consistently at work. The data strategy reinforces the ambition for at least 80% of social care providers to have a digitised care record in place by March 2024.
To support this, £25 million will be made available in 2022/23 to scale up the investment and implementation of digital social care technology across England with integrated care systems including adopting Digital Social Care Records (DSCR) to ensure data is captured at the point of care and can be shared between care settings.
Technologies like remote monitoring tools are already being used successfully to provide more targeted care. The government’s digital home care projects have used remote monitoring to support over 740,000 people with care at home, including care homes residents, improving their health outcomes and reducing the burden on the NHS, supporting clinicians as they focus on tackling the covid.
Speaking at the HealthTech summit, Health and Social Care Secretary Sajid Javid is also expected to say:
The data strategy will be followed by the publication of the digital health and care plan shortly which brings together government’s aspirations for digital transformation for health and social care with an ambitious delivery plan.
Additional Quotes:
Simon Madden, Joint Head of NHS Transformation Digital Policy Unit said:
NHS Digital CEO Simon Bolton said:
Professor Ben Goldacre, author of the recent Goldacre Review and Director of the Bennett Institute at the University of Oxford, said:
Sir John Bell said:
Sir Martin Landray, Professor of Medicine & Epidemiology, University of Oxford and co-lead of the RECOVERY trial said: