MFT
patients seem to expect it now, and I think now
that people have been consulting with their GP
like this, we'll see this is how a large proportion
of the country wants to carry on."
Her own partner is an example of how
beneficial remote consultations can be.
Despite living in Scotland, he had complex
heart surgery in London, and following that had
to travel to London once a year for evaluations.
Now this can be undertaken virtually.
"This will be a big difference for us from
the point of view of specialist intervention,"
she says. "It makes collaboration between
his clinician in Scotland and the clinician
in London much more feasible, and the
communication seems to be much better."
However, large number of consultations
will still need to be carried out by phone in
the immediate future, as Greater Manchester
has a huge amount of digital poverty.
Recent research showed that nine million
people in the UK experience digital poverty,
having little or no access to the internet;
of this figure, 40 per cent are based in
northern England.
"That's one of the reasons telephone
consultations have remained high,
because we have a big digitally excluded“We're thinking about how library or
other public internet access can be made
available, so that people can access care
in a different way. We're thinking five to
10 years down the line, not just for the
next 18 months to two years”
DR VERONICA DEVLIN
CTO, MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY
NHS FOUNDATION TRUSTbusinesschief.eu 205