[GLLUG] Comments please

[bap at shrdlu.com]

I am a volunteer member of the local NHS hospital trust up here in
sunny Wigan-sur-la-mer. It involves attending various meetings and
offering any advice we can. I was at one a few weeks ago where the CEO
set out a modernisation plan that looked quite comprehensive. Looks
like he knows what he wants to do if the government will let him. I had
a quick chat with him after the meeting.

 

It turns out that he's an old skool Linux and BSD hacker. He would like
to make more use of open-source software. Of course he doesn't have
freedom to kick MS into touch but would be willing and able to
investigate what could be done. I've let the idea fester in the back of
my brain for a while and I've come up with some ideas. On the basis of
'go large or go home' I've put together the outline of an ambitious
plan and I'd like your thoughts on it.

 

The NHS is the largest employer in Europe. It has more autonomy than
other government departments and in the main it's run by people who
know what they are doing. But the current government is piling on a lot
of pressure to improve efficiency. They want better results without
extra costs. Nobody really knows what that will mean. At the same time
the government5 is probably planning to fold-in the care-services
currently funded (barely) by local authorities. There are opportunities
here.

 

Elsewhere in the world every country has similar healthcare issues and
in the third-world that sometimes means running software on ancient
hand-me-down computers, often running old versions of Windows. They
could do with some help too. The USA is looking at universal healthcare
but it's not going to happen unless the Democrats gain enough power to
amend the constitution or someone comes up with a way to enable
individual states to agree a nationwide strategy. Hell might freeze
over first.

 

So here's a plan:

1.	Create an open-source healthcare discussion group. 
2.	Create an international standards body for backbone systems
3.	Along with the NHS design and develop
primary/secondary/tertiary healthcare management tools

a.	To build a free-as-in-beer system for healthcare administration
in the third-world
b.	Introduce more free-as-in-speech software to the NHS and
government

4.	In a mutual backscratching exercise persuade the NHS to use
their management and development resources to take over maintenance for
some of the orphaned open-source utility and infrastructure projects.
5.	By working with the NHS and third-world healthcare providers
develop a consultancy arm of the NHS to co-ordinate international
systems integration. Open-source by default.
6.	By making the NHS the go-to people for large-scale healthcare
systems position them as the obvious people to implement universal
healthcare in the USA when the time is right
7.	Make the NHS revenue-neutral. 

 

Bernard Peek

30 Rosemary Crescent, Wigan WN1 3XF

 <mailto:bap at shrdlu.com> bap at shrdlu.com

 

 

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