London’s Chelsea and Westminster (C&W) hospital is aiming to show patient X-rays at the bedside after an electronic picture archiving and communications (Pacs) system goes live this week.

Hospital staff can already access patient information on the wards thanks to a project linking the Patient Line bedside entertainment system with the main clinical records systems.

Pacs will use the same system to display X-rays, says Chelsea and Westminster IT director Alex Geddes.

‘It is an exciting use of our existing assets,’ he said.

Electronic X-rays are being rolled out across the NHS regions as part of the £6bn National Programme for NHS IT (NPfIT), and are being installed by local service provider BT.

C&W is also live on the national electronic bookings system.

The hospital’s maternity, surgery, orthopaedics and day surgery clinics are now accessible to patients and GPs across the country through the Choose & Book (C&B) system.

C&B is one of the major elements of the National Programme, but Chelsea and Westminster has spent £500,000, a seventh of its annual IT budget, linking to the system because it could not wait for the central schedule.

‘We were just not on the C&B schedule for [London supplier] BT,’ said Geddes. ‘We might have had to wait years but we have been losing referrals to other hospitals that are live on C&B and we did not want to be outside the care economy.’

£550m GP IT deals go ahead

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