System C has been awarded a contract to integrate around 800,000 child health records across the whole South Central region using its market-leading CarePlus Child Health software.

The project follows an NHS England procurement for a comprehensive record of public health screening and immunisation interventions for children across Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire, Gloucestershire, Swindon and Bath and North East Somerset (BANES).

The procurement was won by NHS commissioning support unit South, Central and West, with System C as its IT partner.

System C’s CarePlus Child Health solution is already used by over 8,400 care professionals in the UK, providing child health services to over 6.2 million children. It is deployed both in small, defined geographic areas and as single instances that span whole regions such as the West Midlands and Greater Manchester.

Under this latest project, System C will be combining records and services across 14 CCGs, five local authorities and six unitary authorities. Data will be migrated from three other systems providers to provide a unified child health information service.

The introduction of CarePlus will allow staff to keep track of each child’s screening and immunisation records, if they move to another area within the South Central area. CarePlus will also provide automated new birth registration and integration with a wide range of organisations and services, including the maternity hospital, blood spot laboratories, hearing screening services, GP practices, the Personal Demographics Service and the NIPE SMART system for newborn and infant physical examinations.

CarePlus has a comprehensive range of fully-integrated modules, supporting the Healthy Child Programme (HCP).

Sue Trinder, CHIS director, South, Central and West, said the creation of a single child health information service was a positive step for screening and immunisation care in the South Central region. “A single IT system supports our mission to create interfaces with multiple providers and IT access for health and care services”, she explained.

“It’s a vital part of ensuring that all the health professionals who rely on our service have access to the latest, most comprehensive and up to date information about every child they care for.”

Markus Bolton, joint chief executive of System C, added: “It is great to be working with South, Central and West to integrate and maintain a single child record which will contribute to the protection and health of children. Unified record projects of this sort are vital for remodelled NHS services and we are delighted to bring our experience and expertise to this project.”