NHS Appraisal. The Pen and Paper Solution

The NHS Appraisal Fiasco is being covered by Pulse. Following the recent security blip covered by the Register, the Department of Health has apparently been writing placatory letters to the local PCTs.

"The Department of Health has written to PCTs stating doctors should not be ‘penalised’ because they are unable to complete their appraisals, after the NHS Appraisal Toolkit was taken offline because of its vulnerability to hackers"

I thought the whole idea of appraisals and revalidation was to prevent the next Dr Shipman. It is clear by the above statement that the Department of Health does not believe that patient safety would be put at risk by the delays caused by their incompetence.

"The move - made in agreement with the BMA and RCGP – has led to huge upheaval in the appraisal system at its busiest time of the year, and could delay the passage to revalidation for those taking part in pilots of the system"

Does this mean, the Department of Health agrees that there should be delays in spotting the next Dr Harold Shipman?! Surely not! All that pomp and circumstance about harassing doctors and punishing them with the sole aim in deviating the pointed finger from the real people responsible for Harold Shipman.

Dr Charles West, a GP Appraiser in Shropshire and parliamentary candidate for the Liberal Democrats, condemned the decision to take the site offline.

‘Technical staff running the system say knowing the potential problem would have allowed them to monitor it for any incorrect use. But the health minister decided the service should be shut down without notice.’

For a target driven National Health Service, it is rather amusing that the Department of Health cannot meet its own targets to prevent the next Dr Harold Shipman. This of course leads us to question whether the Department of Health is really convinced that appraisals and revalidation is the way forward to catch the next serial killer. If they were convinced, they would have made a damn sure that the system was hacker proof before implementing it thereby preventing delays.

There is of course a different solution, the Department of Health could supply all doctors with free pens, a Department of Health Serial Killer Prevention Folder and some NHS Headed paper, envelope and free postage. It may well be more reliable :).

Sadly, it is clear as the light of day that the Department of Health's Microsoft driven system is not hacker proof and never will be. Microsoft's record has not been wonderful.

Of course, there are people like Gary McKinnon who would probably be able to hack past anything the Department of Health creates. It is good to know that doctors' professional assessments can be accessed by any reasonable hacker anywhere in the world. This will no doubt warm the cockles of every doctor who is sitting there with their vast array of appraisals completed by their medical friends.

Of course, again vast numbers of doctors continue to be asleep. Must be all those late night oncalls and low pay in the NHS because few fail to understand what this admission of a potential security breach means. This is of course just another day in the NHSHIT system.

Centralised data = Access by Hackers = No System is Secure.

Read more coverage by the Register here.