Summary

NHS Digital published its strategy to move the provision of services away from private networks/Health and Social Care Network (HSCN) to adopt an Internet First Policy in line with GDS policy. In addition the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care published the technology vision The Future of Healthcare, which includes the fundamental principle of Internet first:-

When we adopt internet standards and protocols for our networks and digital services:

• we maximise the amount of technologies and digital services that will work for us and for those we care for
• we maximise the number of developers and software engineers that can help us transform health and care and meet the needs of our users
• we minimise what you need to learn to build software and digital services for health and care
• we maximise the amount of distributed data we can handle

Our health and care system will never be a centralised service, because it services the citizens of an entire nation, and so too should its infrastructure not be centralised. But appropriate access to our data from any part of it – like you can access your email from anywhere, as long as you have the right passwords – is an important part of delivering care and staying healthy where we want to be

The NHS Digital Internet First programme will begin consultation on the Internet First Standard and supporting guidance in Spring 2019 and plan to publish the Standard as part of the NHS Digital, Data and Technology Standards Framework in Autumn 2019 following the consultation. The Hosting & Infrastructure standard will be uplifted to reflect these changes and suppliers will be required to become fully compliant by July 2021.

This has been identified as a Secretary of State priority.