Greater Manchester’s care coordination body has taken as a step towards a major migration to cloud systems by indicating its intention to work with a locally based specialist in the field.
The Greater Manchester Health and Social Care Partnership (GMHSC Partnership) has selected Shaping Cloud as the preferred supplier to carry out a series of measures with the long term aim of building a cloud platform for collaboration.
These include an asset review, scheduled for completion in the spring 2019, to identify the software applications and baseline the infrastructure currently used by the 20 NHS and local government organisations involved in the partnership.
It will also identify and address the need for organisations to have an information governance compliant asset register, as well as support workforce training and development needs that come with wider use of the cloud.
The plan also includes mapping the enterprise architecture to identify current regional infrastructure. This will lead to the development of a costed plan on what applications and storage can move to the cloud, with the potential to provide further financial savings and productivity benefits.
GMHSC Partnership interim chief digital officer Stephen Dobson (pictured) said: “Seeing what technology is in use across the public sector should mean the review will pay for itself in procurement efficiencies.
“However, it is the wider benefits of cloud adoption that are more attractive. Cloud is coming whether we like it or not. What I want to do is to accelerate the move to the cloud across Greater Manchester. I’m trying to get to the future faster.”
He added that the move should provide more opportunities for flexible working and collaboration between multidisciplinary teams in support of the increased integration of health and social care.
Devolved responsibility
The GMHSC Partnership is made up of NHS organisations and councils in the Great Manchester area and is responsible for overseeing the devolved health and care services and taking charge of the £6 billion health and social care budget as well as a £450 million transformation fund.
Along with the cloud migration plan, network connectivity is being strengthened through early adoption of the Health and Social Care Network and investment in full fibre networks, and information sharing is being stepped up through the GMHSC Partnership’s successful Local Health and Care Record Exemplar bid.
Image by Sergio Santos, CC BY 2.0 through flickr
