Thought leadership

Digitisation is the act of turning everything into zeroes and ones. It is everywhere, not least in the health service. From our patient records to the equipment in the hospitals, from the development of the next generation of drugs and interventions to the design, construction and operations of buildings, everything is now digitised. The last three decades have seen digital health flourish.
In a world of mobiles, and wearables, of Android and IOS, of Windows and Mac, would it have been foolish of us to expect that the digitisation of everything health to a series of zeroes and ones would create a panacea of interoperability, data exchange, digital citizens and connected society? It is now clear that the digital agenda across the various aspects of the health system, across the UK and the globe, has not taken a steady course or arrived at a place of common language. Different organisations have pursued different approaches, different technologies, and different supplier-developed solutions.
So, is this an issue? We have integrated care systems forming and ICS chief information officers collaborating and developing their digital strategies. We have NHSX and NHS Digital and Digital champions – we are tooled up and nothing can stop us… Right? Wrong.
The expansion of digitisation across health creates an exponential rise in the complexity of connectivity and interoperability issues. The care spectrum has an ever-expanding organisational base, and each comes with its own systems and products which speak different languages at different speeds with a differing richness of sound – some are just tone deaf! The gap between reality and panacea expands.
And if that isn’t enough, it is anticipated that the UK is facing an ever-increasing gap. In health alone, it is estimated that there is a need for over 30,000 digital leaders in the next 10 years. The system needs to act soon to develop the educational capability and infrastructure to address this gap – and create an environment in which these highly skilled leaders will want to operate in the health system, to support the delivery of health and society outcomes for the generations to come and not just gain the skills and then jump to better-paid private sector roles.
As Professor Rachel Duncombe of Imperial College London and former CEO of the NHS Digital Academy highlights, we could be facing a perfect storm: unsatisfied demand for a skilled workforce; policies, systems and suppliers that do not work together to tackle interoperability; and a lack of timely investment.
Without alignment, we will lack the informatic power needed to offer a citizen-centric health system, in which acute, primary, and social care talk effortlessly to one another, and where industry and academia can talk effortlessly to utilise warehoused data and knowledge to predict, prevent or test the solutions to future health needs. So, to unlock this worldly potential in a high-tech, global Britain the most obvious gap needs to be filled – that of financial investment in educational capability. This needs to be filled now, not in five or seven years so UK PLC retains a digital legacy of educational skills development and capability. And, whilst we are staring into a rocky economic outlook, the gamble of waiting for more affluent times may be a wait we can ill afford.
Digitisation is everywhere, and the health service is not an exception. From our patient records to the equipment in the hospitals, from the development of the next generation of drugs and interventions to the design, construction and operations of buildings – everything is now digitised. The last three decades have seen digital health flourish.
But the expansion of digitisation across health creates an exponential rise in the complexity of connectivity and interoperability issues. 
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