Posts by ITDoc

Re: Do it in house

I find it frankly worrying that a hospital governor posts these sorts of comments and wonders why the NHS does so badly.

> The NHS is one of the largest employers in the world. It could easily employ a relatively large number of

> developers and write pretty much all of the software in needs in-house. They would never be idle as there's

> a huge amount that always needs writing.

As the largest employer should it also hire builders the next time a infrastructure project is under taken. Of course not what expertise is there in the NHS to hire competent developers and to project manage an IT project of this scale, forget implementation and support afterwards.

> I've worked within the private sector on a large number of NHS projects and proposals. The amount of money

> scammed out of the NHS by large SIs is sickening.

I too have seen sickening amounts of money squandered in the NHS. But often this is due to ineptitude on the part of those procuring. Why should suppliers have the NHS over a barrel. Negotiate the support contract right in the first place and there is no barrel to be put over. Also where were you when the plain sighted scam was being undertaken. Surely you should have spoken up and put a stop to it.

> At the moment, if a clinician finds a problem with software then it's bad luck if the spec wasn't quite right -

> the supplier might change it for a huge fee.

Again poor contracting. At the time of the tender, establish the hourly rate for further work and have it in the contract. Work with your supplier. Build a relationship. And don't bury mistakes so that no one else can learn from them.

The last thing the NHS needs is to diversify into being an IT company. But institutionally it needs to understand the fundamentals of what it is trying to procure. It needs to understand that insisting upon open standards in the software that is delivered is essential. Open interfacing with other system should be a requirement not an expensive bolt on or non-existent. It needs to understand that there are suppliers other than microsoft and that they in all likelihood will deliver a better product.