NHS Orkney has delayed the launch of its new digital affected person document (EPR) to spring 2026 due to “vital useful resource challenges”.
The well being board signed a take care of Cambric Techniques, a provider of healthcare affected person information software program options throughout Scotland, in September 2024 to roll out its MORSE EPR, which was deliberate to go stay with the primary providers in early 2025.
In a board paper, revealed on 30 October 2025, Laura Skaife-Knight, the previous chief govt of NHS Orkney who has since moved to NHS Grampian, informed board members that “a number of obstacles have been encountered in relation to deployment of the MORSE group EPR”.
A spokesperson for NHS Orkney informed Digital Well being Information: “We’ve confronted vital useful resource challenges which have impacted on our EPR deployment timelines.
“These obstacles have been acknowledged, and we’re working to handle them successfully and are planning to go-live with MORSE within the spring of 2026.”
Commenting on the delay, Gary Sherriff, director of Cambric Techniques stated: “We recognise the pressures NHS Orkney has been managing and totally assist the revised timeline.
“The programme stays in a robust place, with glorious engagement from scientific and operational groups throughout the board.
“Morse is designed to switch methods that not meet trendy service wants, and we’re happy to be working intently with NHS Orkney to ship a sturdy, future-focused digital affected person document that can convey lasting advantages for workers and sufferers alike.”
Earlier this 12 months, a whistleblowing concern was raised to the Impartial Nationwide Whistleblowing Officer by NHS Orkney employees across the present EPR system and the transfer from paper to digital information.
Dr Anna Lamont, medical director and govt lead for whistleblowing at NHS Orkney, informed Digital Well being Information: “The priority highlighted was that, because of a transition from paper information to digital information, there was an preliminary backlog of paper information that had not been digitised and had been thus inaccessible to employees.
“This concern has since been addressed, with all information now scanned and uploaded to the digital EPR system.”
Lamont additionally shared that staff had complained concerning the present EPR system not adequately assembly the service’s necessities.
“This problem was acknowledged, and it was agreed that we might transfer to implementing the MORSE group EPR system.
“As an interim measure, an extra function was launched inside the present EPR to help employees in reviewing and documenting care,” she stated.
In the meantime, it was reported in November that delays to a joint Oracle EPR programme at South Warwickshire College NHS Basis Belief and George Eliot Hospital NHS Belief might price round £1 million a month after it fell behind within the ‘localisation section’, during which the core system and its workflows are tailor-made to fulfill the particular wants of the belief.
In 2024, Sheffield Instructing Hospitals NHS Basis Belief and Airedale NHS Basis Belief had been additionally each pressured to delay their deliberate EPR programme go-live dates.
