Some years ago, the Badger led part of a national UK programme for trading wholesale electricity. The national programme was struggling to stay on plan, a fact increasingly obvious to all the industry, supplier and public servants involved. Delay was inevitable, and most organisations involved inevitably manoevured to avoid being blamed and being exposed to the associated commercial ramifications. The Regulator asked the Badger for an honest view of the programme’s status. The Badger set out the facts and said a delay was inevitable. The Regulator smiled, and said ‘I know, but there needs to be ‘an event’, dear boy, before our masters will accept the need for any change’. Experienced large-scale programme, project or service delivery leaders will recognise the truth of the Regulator’s words.
The COVID-19 pandemic is ‘an event’ that has challenged national healthcare systems across the world. In the UK, for example, the National Health Service (NHS) has moved faster to overcome embedded bureaucratic, administrative, structural and operational issues in the last two months than it has ever done in its entire history. This imperative has rapidly changed the way things currently work for General Practitioners (GPs) in the community, hospital managers, doctors, nurses and other clinicians in hospitals, those providing goods or services in supply chains, and of course patients alike. Everyone, including patients, are realising that speedy change for the better is possible and that technology is nothing to be frightened of when used intelligently and properly.
The Badger saw such enlightenment first-hand last week. A very elderly neighbour was fretting because their routine hospital outpatient appointment had been changed to a telephone consultation. However, after the telephone consultation with the same doctor they would normally have seen face to face, the neighbour’s anxiety had completely evaporated. They were overjoyed to have avoided travelling twenty miles for a face to face meeting that would rarely be on time and last only a few minutes. They were also very keen to try a video call for the next appointment, as suggested by the doctor, even though they have neither broadband nor a smartphone!
The pandemic constitutes ‘an event’ and an opportunity to trigger permanent change and improvement. If we have ‘Smart Meters’ and ‘Smart Motorways’ isn’t it time we had a truly ‘Smart National Healthcare System’ that embraces the different ways of working suited to today’s digital world? Our leaders must ensure we emerge from COVID-19 with a stronger national healthcare system. It would be a travesty to revert to old ways, especially when this ‘event’ has shown that technology is not the barrier for a truly ‘Smart National Healthcare System’…it’s the willingness to change long established operational and functional practices.
