Northern Ireland Department of Health selects Lyniate for encompass

The Northern Ireland Department of Health has selected Lyniate’s Rhapsody to provide data integration technologies for its national digital transformation initiative.

As part of the Encompass programme’s aim to create a single digital record for every citizen, Lyniate will integrate multiple health and social care systems containing the electronic records of patients and service users across the country.

Not only will this help Northern Ireland on its ambition to be the first UK country with a single, connected electronic patient record, but it will also help improve patient outcomes through better support for health and care professionals.

Rhapsody is already used in 79 NHS trusts and provides seamless integration with disparate systems, such as the electronic patient record, lab information system and diagnostic imaging. By bringing all this together it makes it easier for clinical staff to see all vital information on patients across all elements of their care.

Dan West, Northern Ireland Department of Health chief digital information officer, said: “Although Rhapsody works in the background, it ultimately helps improve frontline services for clinicians and patients.”

He continued: “Interoperability across our information and systems along with the roll-out of the new clinical platform unlocks the potential that exists for digital to play an important role in closing the capacity gap.

“Having Rhapsody as part of our IT infrastructure will help Northern Ireland on our path to becoming the first UK country with a single, connected electronic patient record. The solution will also help future-proof our IT environment so we can be more cost and time effective for care professionals and service users, enabling us to focus on delivering the safest and highest quality of care to the people of Northern Ireland.”

The Encompass programme includes the rollout of Epic to supply integrated electronic health records across Health and Social Care Northern Ireland (HSCNI). As part of the Epic rollout, Rhapsody will go live in 2023.

Erkan Akyuz, chief executive officer at Lyniate, said: “We are 100% dedicated to solving healthcare problems and are honoured that HSCNI chose Rhapsody to improve the accessibility of, and trust in, health data as the country accelerates digital healthcare transformation. With Rhapsody, HSCNI can ensure the right data is in the hands of the right people at the right time.”

Earlier this month Lyniate announced it had entered a definitive merger agreement with CareCom which will support the extension of its healthcare interoperability capabilities.