But there is much more we can do to make a connected-health economy a reality in Northern Ireland. So today in addition to the establishment of the Centre I am announcing a major new programme for chronic disease. It will use technology to bring better care to people and reduce our reliance on hospitals.
In the budget proposals announced earlier today I have secured an additional £46m over the next three years to introduce new approaches to chronic disease management. All the evidence points to a better outcome for patients when technology is used for remote monitoring of vital signs in their homes. This allows for early intervention and helps avoid hospital admissions.
I want to see such approaches firmly embedded in the way care is delivered to our population, wherever they live. So I am announcing a major procurement of telemedicine. By 2011, some 5,000 patients in Northern Ireland with chronic disease will have access to a remote monitoring service for their conditions.
This will be one of the largest procurements of this nature in Europe. This is a major investment in new and modern approaches to healthcare provision. The total investment package will by 2011 total some £22m annually. In UK terms this is the equivalent of an investment of some £0.5bn. The extra monies will also allow us to strengthen our community health and social care services so that they can respond quickly to patient’s needs.
There are other measures which I will wish to see put in place to achieve our goal of a connected health economy. I will want to see how telemedicine approaches can help improve our stroke and radiology services. We have been looking recently at our imaging systems. Many are outmoded and rely heavily on film. We need to move forward and provide modern diagnostic services.
I can announce today that we will be introducing a new digital Picture Archiving and Communications System across Northern Ireland. This will allow the electronic storing and sharing of patient diagnostic images and X-rays and reports relating to a patient's clinical history, between Trusts and GP practices. This initiative will bring significant cost savings and, more importantly, will greatly improve the speed of access to clinical images – faster reporting and diagnosis and better and more timely information for healthcare professionals. Implementation will take around 18 months and will start this summer.
