NHS technology: Improving outcomes for staff and patients
According to budget calculations by the UK Government, investments in technologies such as AI could earn the NHS £35 billion in productivity savings by 2030.
New NHS technology systems and ways of working could streamline administrative processes, enabling better experiences for staff and patients.
I recently explored how technology can improve NHS operations as the lead author of the ServiceNow NHS Digital Transformation white paper. Here’s my take on the most important themes from the paper.
Improving staff experiences
To attract and retain talent, the NHS must improve experiences for staff. Today, disparate systems and extensive software sprawl leave data, passwords, and functionality fragmented across services. This creates a poor user experience for NHS employees.
Each touchpoint that makes up the employee journey must be streamlined, from onboarding, to internal transfers between trusts, to eventual offboarding.
By redesigning the digital estate and consolidating workflows onto a single, unified platform, the NHS can free up valuable employee time. That time can then be redirected to what truly matters: patient care.
Standardising corporate services
Many NHS bodies implement non-standardised processes for vital functions such as IT, HR, supply chain, and finance. It’s common for trusts and integrated care systems (ICSs) to use disparate technology solutions and service delivery models for the same tasks, resulting in mixed quality standards.
By delivering federated corporate services, the NHS can make processes more consistent, help ensure continuity between locations, and reduce financial leakage.
Minimising digital vulnerabilities
The NHS’s digital systems are vulnerable to outages and cyber threats that put patient outcomes at risk. According to NHS England, an IT outage in July 2024 caused disruptions in most national general practitioner practices and forced a return to paper-based administrative processes.
NHS England also reported a cyber attack on a pathology services provider in June 2024 that delayed more than 10,000 outpatient appointments and 1,700 elective procedures up to four months later.
Centralisation of security monitoring and management can help protect organisations against digital vulnerabilities. The NHS can use tools for asset discovery, proactive threat management, and automated remediation to gain oversight and help ensure continuous patient care across its network of trusts and ICSs.
Transforming patient workflows
Slow, manual processes can prevent clinical staff from spending face time with patients. New systems and processes can enable faster patient discharges and virtual care in the NHS.
For example, ServiceNow can connect disparate data sources to create a “patient passport.” This allows clinicians to monitor and deliver post-discharge services to patients in the community.
Digitalisation may also help clinical staff route patients to the best-fit treatment pathways. A centralised knowledge base could enable nurses to easily move patients who no longer need hospital treatment to another facility, supporting a smooth transition from healthcare to social care.
A more streamlined approach could help patients be seen quicker and reduce the referral-to-treatment waiting list, which comprised more than 7 million cases in March 2025, according to the British Medical Association.
Integrating AI with NHS technology
The NHS has an immediate opportunity to mitigate challenges and improve productivity. In IT, AI can predict and resolve incidents across the digital estate, helping to maintain service continuity. AI agents can be deployed to support medical staff with patient triage, providing clinicians with more time to focus on complex or sensitive cases.
Senior medical leaders are pushing for digital transformation. ServiceNow can help NHS trusts accelerate consolidation and AI integration to improve outcomes for staff and patients.
Explore more insights in our NHS Digital Transformation white paper.