§ Mr. HunterTo ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what progress has been made in the testing of the message handling service being offered by BT Syntegra scheduled to take place between August and December 1994; [17683]
931W(2) when she expects the message handling service being provided by BT Syntegra to be fully available to the NHS; and what are the expected cost savings; [17684]
(3) what is the cost to her Department of the procurement of the message handling service; [17686]
(4) how the message handling service of the NHS is currently being provided; which company provides this service; and how many users subscribe to this network. [17685]
§ Mr. SackvilleThere are currently two message handling services available to the national health service: one provided by Syntegra and the Healthlink service provided by Racal Data Networks Ltd. The cost of procuring the Healthlink service in 1989–90 by single tender negotiations is estimated at £450,000. The cost of the competitive procurement which resulted in the award of a contract to Syntegra in 1994 is estimated to be £517,000.
As at 1 March 1995, there were about 6,500 subscribers to Healthlink, the majority being general practitioners and dentists. At present, there are about 350 subscribers to Syntegra's MHS.
The Department has successfully completed technical testing of the main components of Syntegra's MHS. User acceptance testing is currently taking place and is scheduled to be completed by the end of April 1995. This activity will therefore be completed approximately 12 weeks after the agreed target date. A number of technical issues were encountered early in the testing which has caused the original timetable to be extended.
The various elements of Syntegra MHS are being introduced over the coming months. The basic messaging service is currently undergoing user acceptance trials, and early users of messaging services will be able to connect to it from April 1995 onwards. Use of the service by family health services authorities will be piloted in May and June, installed in early sites in July to September, then become generally available from October 1995 onwards. Electronic data interchange will become progressively available from the summer of 1995. The Syntegra MHS is an advanced system, offering the latest standards in messaging. The Department and Syntegra have insisted on all aspects of the service being thoroughly tested and piloted before being made available for general use. This policy means that a reliable operational service will be made available at the planned dates.
It is anticipated that cost savings to the NHS from use of Syntegra's MHS, based on the best current projections of service usage and the costs of the two services at August 1994, will be in the range of £70 million to £130 million over seven years compared with the existing Healthlink service.