Benefits management and realisation

• Clinical use of the SCR (PDF, 1.2MB)

This report covers the period to December 2011 and describes some of the ways in which the SCR is being used in the NHS and how specific benefits are being realised as the SCR is adopted in various care settings.

If you are implementing SCRs in your NHS trust, further information can be found in the Benefits Management section of this website including:

• Case studies, feedback and statistics from care settings already viewing SCRs
• Benefits statement detailing benefits to date and predicted benefits
• Clinical pathways and how SCR can benefits specific groups of patients
• End of life benefits and patient pathways.

Benefits to patients

• SCRs are accessible to authorised healthcare staff treating patients in an emergency in England.  This will be particularly useful when a patient cannot give information (for example if they are unconscious) or when they are away from home and are unable to see their own GP.
• Patient care can be supported by healthcare staff having faster access to their medical information and patients may not be required to repeat information to different NHS staff treating them. For example, in a hospital setting, healthcare staff will be able to access a patient's SCRs immediately enabling faster assessment.
• SCRs can support better, safer prescribing of medication for patients by providing up to date information on a patient's allergies, previous adverse reactions and medications.
• SCRs will enable vulnerable patient groups and those patients that are unable to communicate well with healthcare staff. For example, a non-English speaking patient that could struggle to communicate his condition would no longer be disadvantaged as his SCR would be available to the treating clinician.
• Additional information, such as end of life care plans and relevant diagnoses, may be available to inform clinical care where it is appropriate.

Benefits to NHS healthcare staff

• Important patient information will be available to authorised healthcare staff treating patients in an emergency where they had previously not had access to it. This will be particularly useful to NHS staff treating patients in an emergency, when a patient needs treatment out of hours or away from their local area.
• SCRs contains details of a patient's key health information including medications, allergies and adverse reactions. This enables clinicians to feel more confident to treat patients.
• Medicines reconciliation (where a patient's prescribed medication is checked against current medications to ensure there is no conflict) will become more efficient in hospital pharmacies as pharmacists will be able to immediately refer to the SCR in order to reconcile the medications prescribed to the patient.