Being an NHS GP, Dr Rant has access to one of the most highly developed IT systems in the world. If you think a Sinclair ZX81 is 'one of the most highly developed IT sytems in the world'. Or, in other words, Dr Rant has access to the kind of technology that a 1982 teenager would have considered obsolete.
Having decided to spend somewhere in the region of £20 billion on an NHS IT system (the brainchild of that well known technovirgin, Tony Blair) Dr Rant now have access to an email system that is marginally better than the stone-age NHS email system it replaced.
Yes, for 'security' the NHS has shut out most systems that normal IT people would take for granted (Skype, VPN, browser-independent websites and so on). I have to use Internet Explorer and NHS.net email for some key NHS stuff to work at all.
Let's look at two emails I received today from NHS net. The first was a warning that I was near my storage limit for email. Yup, that's right: I have used nearly 80MB of storage. Forget Google's unlimited storage (at least 2.8GB last time I checked) - the NHS only gives you 80MB. That's equivalent to an entry level PS3, so I'm guessing that the NHS's £20 billion did not go on a google-style farm of servers. More likely it went on a gaggle farm of management consultants with the left over pennies being spent on a BBC micro computer and wobbly RAM expansion pack from eBay.
The second email concerns an email I sent to my practice manager from my gmail account. Apparently NHS.net is not happy with this and bounced the email back to me 'Reason: Server rejected MAIL FROM address.
Diagnostic code: smtp;501 Sender domain must exist'. Whatever the fuck that means. In ten years of using email, I've never seen any other email system bounce email with this error message.
Exactly how much wank can you buy for £20 billion? And how much storage space does it take up?
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22 comments:
A major NHS teaching hospital of my acquaintance is inclined to bounce email on the grounds that "The recipient is not available to receive the message". Yep, that's for valid recipients, who just happen to be in clinic/in a meeting/on leave/away from their offices for any of a thousand reasons.
I defy anyone to beat that.
I use Firefox Portable on a usb stick to access nhs.net at work rather than Internet Explorer, if that helps.
Er, actually there is a very good reason for locking down computers with access to sensitive information on them. And yes, this is my professional area of expertise. Any of the million employees in the NHS click on a dodgy e-card (or whatever) link and someone has access, via that computer, to anything on The Spine.
Sounds like they've done a fucking awful job of it mind you. I seem to recall that the Swedes managed to produce a national health service IT system for £20 million (with an m, not a b).
Still, if you reckon that your PC with access to all the medical data in the UK should be working like your home PC, maybe you should read up on stuff like the Storm Botnet.
Herring, my dear chap.
Dr Rant is hardly a IT dullard, so I would be very interested to hear what exactly forcing doctors to use Internet Explorer and giving us an 80MB email limit does for security.
The reasons for the problems are that the NHS is crap at IT. So poor user experience and poor security.
Remember, the NHS brought you such security gems as using a 'unique ID number' as the sole 'hurdle' to finding out junior doctor's sexual persuasions online.
Well, IE wouldn't be my choice, but restricting you to one browser means only having one browser to patch and apply security settings to. You may not be an IT dullard but most people are, and for that reason any organisation that holds sensitive data really should be restricting what PCs can connect to whilst simultaneously connected to that sensitive data. Most people who use a computer as part of their job should be familiar with this.
I'm not saying the way that this has been enforced isn't shite, but I am trying to explain why it has been enforced. I only have access to names/addresses etc. of a couple of million UK citizens as part of my work. If I did what anonymous advocates (brought in unapproved software on a USB stick and used it) I would expect to be immediately dismissed - and I work in a fairly senior position in the IT department. If I did that and personal information got leaked, then I might expect a criminal prosecution.
The 80MB limit - well storage, like NHS resources, has to be rationed.
Well at least it was "working" when you tried !
I cant even get a login screen this afternoon
I've been unable to access any email attachments from my nhs.net account all week. Very handy when the local deanery unilaterally decided that all trainees must have an nhs.net account and all correspondence could only be sent to that address. Our IT department stated that "there appears to be a small problem with the NHS spine.." if only I could copyright this soon to be ubiquitous statement
ha ha what a load of pure shit the NHS IT is. I just don't use it.
I also use firefox at work, and any lardy IT boy (they are always soggy round the middle mummy's boys aren't they?) is risking injury telling me not to.
anyway DrRant - I am upset about you linking the fantastic Speccy to this story - as far as I know the fucking NHS IT system won't run Horace Goes Skiing or 3D deathchase!
....nor Manic Miner, Jet-Set Willy or Football Manager.
It retrospect, give me Sir Clive Sinclair's finest any day. Loading data by tape is quicker than retrieving one's NHS emails anyway.
Actually a bog standard PS£ has 40 GIGABYTES of storage.
80mb is smaller than the average mobile phone memory.
Typical,
You cant even get your facts correct...
It also shocks me that you cant understand the need for data security and the ever growing needs to tighten it.
May be one day you will use that so called brain of yours.
Idiots
Hi just found your post when looking for soemthing else. I've had the same error with bounced back email and it usually corrects given time. The problem is the reverse DNS lookup for the MX entry of the sending mail domain not being found. I haven't yet established if it's an NHS mail connector problem or the sending servers. Given this was Google, I rather suspect it's an NHS mail problem. I have discussed this with an engineer from Cable and Wireless who maintain nhs mail but since it self corrected there wasn't much point digging for the reason it happened.
You know if you spent more time supporting and working with it to help improve something that you obviously feel so passionately about instead of putting your energy / brain power (?) into anti propoganda ........ we might have something that meets drs expectations.
"if you spent more time supporting and working with it to help improve something..."
They won't let us get involved.
They don't want us to be involved.
They won't let us improve things.
Our suggestions get ignored.
Our input gets laughed at.
Add this to the fact that UK GPs were are highly tech-savvy (we grew up with ZX-81s) and have set up several Electronic Patient Record systems which are superior to anything else on the market - systems which have been dumped in favour of 'big business' $20 billion paperweights that don't work, and you can see that we might have reason for ranting.
Or, in other words, FUCK OFF YOU SANCTIMONIOUS CUNT!
"unable to access any email attachments from my nhs.net account all week. Very handy when the local deanery unilaterally decided that all trainees must have an nhs.net account and all correspondence could only be sent to that address. Our IT department stated that "there appears to be a small problem with the NHS spine.." if only I could copyright this soon to be ubiquitous statement"
Delete your temp internet files this will allow you to open attachments through the web portal....
I like the data security argument. It's crap. We are forced to use nhs.net mail in the gp surgery and I do not have much problem with that. But most of the departments at our PCT do NOT use it. Yet they audit us every year on confidentiality, security and such. Hypocrites.
Exaclty who has access to the bill of the I.T system. I'd like to see them justify £20 BILLION. On any scale, what would take up so much of the money. Sounds to me like loads of it must have been going into 'other projects'.
These projects could range form pockets too wallets to bank accounts too spending willy nilly on new cars, ahem, I mean mice and keyboards.
How could it take soooooo much money to develop the software and hard ware for the system at such a high cost. We arent sending someone to the moon for fuck sake. I could have done it for 20 QUID! Haha, perhaps that's a little harsh but by the sounds of it My system may have been better. So what now, what will happen to the system. Add Why is blair still alive?
Whilst I agree that the webmail client for NHS.net accounts is appalling, there is a way out.
Tucked away in the documentation is the IMAP and SMTP settings to allow you to fetch your mail from whatever client you like (Outlook, Thunderbird, even your blackberry).
You need to ensure SSL is selected and its probably wise not to have it remember your password, but after that you're free to use whatever client you like.
couldn't agree more, you might not believe this however, trust me..... for reasons not worth going into i couldn't drive to central belt for meetings etc. approx 150 miles round journey. to make reasonable adjustments my boss suggested installing a webcam for me to participate in meetings etc. great, just needed to check with IT and guess what...no webcam at all can be linked to the system in case it makes NHS net collapse!! i also asked what type of webcam would be acceptable.... none the system couldn't cope!!! true saying if you pay in peanuts
What on earth do you need more than 80meg for anyway? It's a bloody email system not a doc store. Oh and it's the most secure way I have, within the NHS, of transferring sensitive. It cost far too much though, I'll give you that.
You're comparing the NHS system to a zx81, but your photo is of a Spectrum 48K.
You should sort yourself out.
I am so glad that those of you that are using such foul language are not any of my colleagues.
Yes it is slow yes it is rubbish so keep hassling the idiots that program/develop/run it -and for goodness sake get a life - it is only a email system and what time does a clinician have to fiddle with such things anyway -obviously none of the good ones !
Depressed of Lowestoft
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