Wi-Fi will be key to realising plans for paperless prescriptions in the UK, it has been claimed.
Sean Larner, who is international vice-president at wireless network provider Xirrus, has argued that these plans couldn’t be realised without high-speed wireless technology being introduced across Britain’s hospitals.
Writing for publicservice.co.uk, he explained that Wi-Fi would allow doctors and nurses to adopt ‘bring your own device’ schemes and access patients’ digital information from anywhere in their hospital.
“This practice makes life easier for staff as they are able to instantly update patient records more accurately, turning a filing cabinet of notes into a handy mobile device,” he said.
“This technical familiarity translates well into the work environment and will help prevent mistakes happening in the future. Wireless networking makes this trend straightforward to accommodate, without compromising IT security.”
Health secretary Jeremy Hunt announced plans for paperless prescriptions earlier this month. He was particularly hopeful that the £260 million scheme would help to reduce the amount of errors being made on paper prescriptions. Eleven British residents died as a result of this last year.
According to dailymail.co.uk, the scheme will involve personalised barcodes containing prescription information being sent directly to a patient’s pharmacy. It is part of a bigger plan to turn the NHS completely digital by 2018.
