Humber pushes ahead with Lorenzo

Humber NHS Foundation Trust has started to introduce the Lorenzo electronic patient record system, even though the future of the contract under which it is being delivered remains uncertain.

The trust became the fourth early adopter for Lorenzo as part of CSC’s local service provider contract for the North, Midlands and East of England, when Pennine Care NHS Foundation Trust pulled out in April last year.

Pennine Care’s decision to leave the early adopter programme was a blow to the National Programme for IT in the NHS in the NME.

CSC had been told it needed to get Lorenzo live and working at four early adopters to trigger payments under its contract, and to show it was making "substantial progress" with the system.

The Department of Health indicated that it might terminate CSC’s contract in response. Since then, there has been no conclusive answer as to whether the US company will get a new, extended or amended contract.

In 2011, CSC indicated that it expected to do so. But last week, the company told investors that it might not get a memorandum of understanding that was advantageous to it, or any deal at all.

It added that it might have to write-off £1 billion invested in the programme as a result.

Humber NHS Foundation Trust told eHealth Insider it could not comment on the contract status, but confirmed it was fully engaged in introducing the ‘strategic’ EPR.

It said it has created processes across the trust to test the software, with two of the four testing cycles completed.

“The results are very positive with the few software issues identified during testing now included in the Lorenzo go-live build for the trust,” it said in a statement.

Key staff have also completed a ‘train the trainers’ course and are creating training material. Staff would then be able to book into training courses.

The trust has previously told EHI that it was “impressed” with Lorenzo and it was looking forward to using the “rich functionality” it provides.

It was originally due to be a fast follower for Lorenzo, but switched to becoming the final early adopter by updating the existing project initiation document.