On 23 December 2021 Better signed a contract to deliver a new shared care planning solution across the city of London – a footprint covering approximately 10 million people, 5 Integrated Care Systems, 1400 general practices, over 40 NHS Trusts, and 33 local authorities.
On 27 July this year, the service went live across this entire footprint. Going from zero to a live service of this scale in a period of only seven months is a tremendous achievement and was only possible through exceptional teamwork and collaboration between a massive group of stakeholders – including (but not limited to) health and care providers, governance leads, change management teams, national bodies, third-party suppliers, our partners Atos, CareIS, ReStart, and FreshEHR, and of course the Better team.
It also included quite a bit of work on the thing that people often refer to as “the easy bit”. So, the article we offer you to read is an overview of just that – the technology behind the service.
We went for the platform approach
For the new care planning solution, a platform approach was required. And it was important that a first use case was implemented allowing benefits to be realised early, so the first use case identified was end-of-life care planning. End-of-life is a complex area, so it was a good test of the platform approach. The complexity comes from a range of things, including a complex data model, lots of integration with regional and national systems, integration to all point of care systems, and access by patients for bi-directional engagement.
Better platform and all its functionalities
The foundation for all is our Better digital health platform, for which we enable access with contextual launch and a single sign-on that opens a care plan in the patient context, without the need for additional credentials. This foundation enables change and governance to be controlled centrally but functionality to be delivered locally across an entire region.
Discover more about Better
Better is a leading technology company that transforms healthcare organisations with Better Platform, their market-leading open data platform, the Better Meds electronic prescribing and medication administration solution, and Better’s low code Studio, which allows applications to be built rapidly at a fraction of the cost. The company’s solutions are putting organisations in control of their data, workflows, and transformation plans, all with the aim of simplifying the work of care teams and improving lives. In the last three decades, Better has provided solutions to more than 150 clients across 16 countries, and Better Platform securely supports over 22 million patients.
