Prognosis for NPfIT remains uncertain

Coalition's Programme for Government points to NHS reforms but is short on detail

Government will put hospital performance data online

While the coalition government’s Programme for Government reiterates previous commitments around technology and civil liberties, IT procurement and broadband rollout, it is noticeably silent on the future of the NHS National Programme for IT (NPfIT), with no mention of Conservative promises prior to the election to dismantle the "NHS supercomputer" or the Liberal Democrats' pledge to scrap large parts of the NPfIT.

Dismantling the NPfIT would be highly contentious, so it's is perhaps understandable that the coalition would like to punt the issue into the long grass. That said, the Programme for Government does point to future reforms that are bound to have an impact on NHS IT.

The Tories have long argued that IT procurement in the NHS should be decentralised, and this view certainly chimes with the programme's goal of " advancing democracy at a local level".

For some time now local NHS trusts have been able to procure IT outside the strictures of the NPfIT, and this trend may now receive more encouragement from Whitehall.

In a conversation with Computing last month, former Department of Health CIO Matthew Swindells argued that technology would help the government make difficult decisions regarding the NHS.

Specifically, he argued that the publication of performance information online would make difficult decisions – potentially around closing hospitals – easier, and more community driven. He also said that publishing this information would be unpopular within the NHS because of its inherent view of the public "which harks back to the paternalistic attitude of the 1950s".

On this issue, the government and Swindells are very much in tune, with the programme calling for more performance information to be published online based on patients rating hospitals and doctors according to the quality of care their receive.

Meanwhile, Tory plans to replace the Summary Care Records system with some form of personalised web-based records system using either Google or Microsoft technology have been ditched in favour of a vague pledge to "put patients in charge of making decisions about their care including control of their health records".

This may be an oblique reference to a recent decision by Connecting for Health and the BMA to work together to make patients aware of the the Summary Care Records "opt out" clause.

Finally, the programme does retain a Liberal Democrat pledge to use technology to help people communicate with their GPs, with plans for a single urgent care number to go head.