Trusts get RiO upgrade

BT is upgrading community and mental health organisations in London and the south of England to Release 2 of electronic patient record system RiO.

Thirty-three NHS organisations received the system from BT under its National Programme for IT contract covering London and the south, where it is used by 100,000 healthcare professionals.

However, trusts that are thinking of switching to a new supplier at the end of their national contract in October 2015 may choose not to take the upgrade.

Release 2 introduces new functionality, such as mobile disconnected working, automatic discharge summaries at the point of care and case record summary views.

Also, functional enhancements including clinic management and pharmacy verification.

The first organisation to go live with RiO Release 2 will be North East London Foundation Trust.

BT told EHI the trust is due to go live in the coming weeks and final preparation is underway between themselves, the Health and Social Care Information Centre and RiO supplier CSE Healthcare.

A spokesperson for the trust confirmed that it is preparing to deploy RiO 2, but has not set a go-live date.

BT said it would then be rolled out to the remaining 32 organisations over the coming months.

However, chair of the ‘2015 Consortium’, Peter Gooch, said each trust will decide whether to take RiO 2 or not.

The consortium represents 30 community and mental health trusts in London and the South looking for replacement EPRs in preparation for the end of their NPfIT contracts.

Nine suppliers are on a new framework worth up to £300m to supply EPRs, hosting and clinical portals to the trusts beyond October 2015.

“Any sensible trust has to review staying on RiO or moving to an alternate system. If you’re staying on it you’ll give good consideration to taking RiO Release 2, but if not then you have to starting asking is it worth taking R2 or not?”

Gooch added that: “trusts don’t know until they have done their mini-competitions and evaluated all the options whether they will stay with RiO”.

All trusts are expected to complete their mini-competitions by the end of this year.