Enabling The Paperless Office For The Nhs

By Author: Donald Nason
Total Articles: 48
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The NHS is extremely reliant on paper, with hundreds of thousands of paper documents created and manually processed every day. Documents such as patient records and supplier invoices take a very long time to process and file; time which NHS staff could spend doing more strategic tasks.

According to the NHS Commissioning Board's head of informatics Tim Kelsey, the NHS may become completely digitalised by 2015; meaning patient records could become electronic, and invoices will be managed on document management systems. If (and this is a big if) this happens, it will undoubtedly make information more secure and less likely to get lost. Being able to access patient records and other documents more quickly will also mean NHS staff will see a reduction in the amount of time spent searching for files in dusty old filing cabinets.

According to the 2012 Commonwealth International Health Policy Survey, 97% of GP's in the UK claim to already be using electronic medical records. The survey of nearly 8,500 primary care doctors across the world found that the UK came top in its use of information technology. This shows that ...
... technology is already a big part of the NHS and this is expected to continue and increase over the next couple of years. So what other solutions could benefit the NHS?

Implementing an Invoice Processing Solution in the Accounts Payable (AP) department can help to reduce the amount of time and money spent processing supplier invoices. The NHS receives hundreds of thousands of supplier invoices a year, and with the average cost of processing a paper-based invoice being £12, this adds up to a lot of money. By investing in an Invoice Processing Solution will include benefits such as:

• Improved productivity within the Accounts Payable department
• Improved supplier relations
• Improved control over key business processes
• Improved level of service to internal departments
• Reduced data entry costs
• Reduced document storage

Human Resource Management
Another paper centric department is Human Resource (HR) which plays a key role in the successful operation of all NHS trusts. Investing in a Human Resource Management solution can help to automate the traditionally manual processing of key documents such as holiday, absences, expenses, recruitment and payroll. These documents will often exist in several formats like PDF, paper and email, meaning there will be a different workflow process that needs to be carried out for each document. This can be a very time consuming and costly job for the HR staff. Implementing a HR solution can help to process documents efficiently as well as provide benefits such as:

• Retrieve all an employee's documents from one place
• Remove the problems of paper forms
• Increased security
• Reliability of electronic storage

These solutions could help to transform the way the NHS handles documents, but is it completely possible for the NHS to go paper-free? I believe that although a lot of paper is handled manually at hospitals, automating supplier invoices could help to save the NHS a lot of money as well as improve efficiency. In a recent AIIM survey, 70% of respondents consider scanning and capture processes improves the speed of response to customers, suppliers, citizens or staff by three-times or more. This statistic emphasises how much a solution like an Invoice Processing Solution could help businesses with their efficiency needs. So if you have goals to improve efficiency and increase control in your AP department, consider investing in an invoice processing solution to help you automate and streamline your business.

To find out more about Documation’s Invoice Management Solution and the other products and services we provide, please visit our website www.documation.co.uk or email info@documation.co.uk.