Automation and Machine Intelligence: The key to future proofing the NHS?

Tanya Serebryanska, market development and access pharmacist (MPharm, PG Dip GPP, MScAPP), and Wesam Badran, national solutions manager, UK & Ireland, Becton Dickinson (BD) consider the key role automation can play in the NHS in the years to come.

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Joan Ford

In 2020, former health secretary Sajid Javid set out a bold plan to deliver a health system that would be faster, more effective and provide more personalised care through digital transformation. This plan aims to prioritise implementation of solutions like robotics, that can support a stretched workforce and help improve patient safety and mitigate medication errors. Medication errors are the most common adverse event in hospitals and have significant economic and health consequences. In this day of innovation, we have the tools to ease the burden for healthcare professionals and reduce the impact of human errors, in relation to medication errors. The use of automation and artificial intelligence (AI) is integral within the medtech space to reduce this impact, and data management is becoming increasingly important to interpret and learn from.

With existing technology constantly evolving and new technologies being introduced to the market, it can be overwhelming for healthcare providers to implement the solutions that are best suited for their organisation. Data led and insight driven organisations are essential in ensuring patient safety and a stable and successful health service.

Ecosystem collaboration

The challenge for the future is encouraging increased collaboration across systems within healthcare settings. There is a need for systems that are truly integrated and communicate with one another in different locations. This allows for the seamless flow of crucial patient data and provides a comprehensive view of different tasks such as drug management, providing data insights for service improvements to take place. 

Medication management is a system of processes and behaviours that determines how medicines are used by the NHS and patients. It should be safe, cost-effective, and ensure that patients receive the most benefit possible from the medications they require, while minimising potential risk. For medication management to be most effective, there should be full connectivity and communication between devices, like smart pumps, and clinical IT systems, such as an electronic patient record and prescribing systems containing patients’ prescribed medications, administration, and outcomes documents. Therefore, technological solutions underpin safety and promote the traceability and compliance of medication from the prescription stage through to administration.

Automating access to patient data is crucial in maintaining real-time records, which in turn supports clinical decision making across staff groups. By collaborating with medtech to introduce and embed automation, it can contribute to efficiencies in care provisions in the long term and help improve treatment outcomes for patients. 

Implementing intelligent technology

AI is becoming increasingly important in improving the interoperability and efficiency of healthcare systems. With NHS staff increasingly stretched, it’s vital to implement technology designed to ease workloads. AI can monitor and analyse patient and clinician behaviour, providing valuable intelligence that allows hospitals to optimise and improve medication management, around areas such as seasonal supply demands. In addition to providing early disease identification and even the possibility of prevention, AI has the potential to revolutionise medical diagnostics by expediting reading time and automatically prioritising urgent cases. 

Finding ways to increase organisational and team expertise is crucial since doing so could; support the health service in reducing administrative demands on staff, have a positive effect on service quality with a decrease in medication errors, enhance patient treatment outcomes, as well as being a more sustainable option by reducing medication waste. 

Currently, disparate systems have varying levels of digital maturity due to lack of funding, communication and culture changes required within primary and secondary care. Focusing on secondary care, several hospitals operating within a single system may be at varying levels of digital maturity. Modern technologies and services are available that can help with streamlining and automating the prescription, transcribing, and the preparation of drugs, which can help with error reductions. 

Standardising these across a system and beyond is vital. Since more than half of medication errors occur during administration, automating medication management is necessary to support the improvement of a wholesome system. Decision makers must take a holistic approach and implement new technologies that support the workforce shortages and maintain a high quality of patient safety system-wide, introducing smart, connected care, and enabling new care settings. 

Looking into the future

Medtech companies can play a critical role in expanding access to automated technologies. By consulting organisations to create streamlined workflows and increasing guidance through data processing, automation can help relieve healthcare workers’ stresses and create safer environments for both patients and staff. Furthermore, the advent of these technologies provides a real opportunity to rethink the organisation of the entire medication process, and a process-oriented approach to this re-engineering is essential for successful implementation.

Automation and patient safety are undeniably linked. Without a connected digital care system, medication error rates cannot be fully addressed. Electronic prescribing coupled with medicines management which goes beyond pharmacy, with a record of medicines administered, is a minimum standard which must be inbuilt into hospital practice to close the loop on crucial operational tasks associated with patient care. Undeniably, there are challenges with embedding such systems and ensuring necessary training is available to HCPs to stay practiced with updated technologies. Although there is some hesitation from the workforce around automation reducing the need for human labour, healthcare staff will not be replaced by automated systems. They will be better equipped with the knowledge, tools, and time to deliver clinical care, therefore increasing patient safety.

Seamless, integrated automated solutions are vital in enabling healthcare professionals to focus on clinical tasks and improving patient care. Technology is playing a critical role in reducing staff time constraints, advancing patient care and interoperable systems that communicate. Connected medtech solutions can allow for a safe and effective digital medicines management in a care setting, closing the loop between safe medicines handling, management, and administration. The NHS's recent rapid adoption of technology is encouraging, and it will be critical in alleviating mounting pressures and planning for the future, ensuring that patients and families are put first.