The NHS National Programme for IT (NPfIT) is probably the most heavily criticised government IT project of all time?

A former colleague of mine, Tony Collins, did a brilliant job revealing disaster after disaster in the £13bn project . IT service providers, quite rightly have also been criticised.

I must point out he also wrote about success stories.

But I was with a director of an IT services company the other day and although he reckons the NPfIT was always likely to fail because it was just too big, he says one of the biggest mistakes made by Connecting for Health was not to talking enough about the success stories. This wouldn’t happen in the private sector.

“A lot of the systems in the NPfIT have been implemented and are working.”

He singled out PACS and Choose and Book for praise.

PACS is the picture archiving and communications system.

It allows x-rays to be stored and transported electronically. The benefits are obvious. For example a doctor in the US can look at a UK x-ray or a doctor can view it while travelling.

The other thing he praised was Choose and Book. This is an online Appointment booking system.