NHS England is yet to find suitable chief technology and information officer

Exact remit for CITO role will be decided when successful candidate is in place, NHS England tells Computing

NHS England is yet to find a suitable chief technology and information officer (CITO), despite applications for the role closing more than four months ago.

The organisation posted a job advert in The Sunday Times back in January, as it looked for someone to take over the duties of national director for patients and information, Tim Kelsey, who left in December 2015.

At the time it said it was seeking an "outstanding" candidate to lead the strategic procurement and successful implementation of IT priorities that will support what it called a "modern, sustainable health and care system".

Since then, however, it has hired Matthew Swindells as the national director of operations and information. Swindells, who joined NHS England in May, had previously been CIO of the Department of Health back in 2007, and was most recently SVP of population health and global strategy at the Cerner Corporation.

It is likely that, considering his role incorporates many of the duties that Kelsey had covered during his tenure at the NHS, the new CITO will report into him. This suggests that NHS England may have found it harder than expected to recruit someone with the specialist skills it was looking for to lead technology within the NHS, and is instead splitting the role into two.

NHS England did not respond to several questions Computing had about the CITO recruitment process. However, an NHS spokesperson said that the exact remit for the CITO role will be decided when a successful candidate is in place.

On the delay of recruiting a CITO, the spokesperson said: "The chief technology and information officer will have a crucial role to play in modernising the health service and it's important we take the time to find the right person."

The successful candidate will be based at NHS England and work with other national bodies, including NHS Improvement, the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) - which leads the controversial care.data project alongside NHS England - and the Department of Health.