Across the East Midlands, seven acute NHS trusts are working together in a new way to solve shared problems, unlock opportunities, and transform care at scale using Nervecentre’s EPR platform.
University Hospitals of Leicester, Nottingham University Hospitals, University Hospitals of Derby and Burton, Chesterfield Royal Hospital, Northampton General Hospital, United Lincolnshire Teaching Hospitals, and Sherwood Forest Hospitals all made independent decisions to adopt Nervecentre.
Now, through the East Midlands Acute Providers (EMAP) network, they are turning that shared choice into a more connected, practical model of collaboration that works across organisational boundaries. Together, they represent a significant scale:
- 17 acute hospitals
- 8,549 beds
- 82,600 staff
- Up to 5.48 million patients
Traditionally, trusts have delivered digital programmes independently, often tackling the same challenges at the same time, but in different ways.
EMAP is taking a different approach, with a conscious shift towards collaboration and working together to:
- Align on shared priorities, focusing effort where it has the greatest impact
- Develop and reuse improvements, rather than duplicating work
- Build shared capability, connecting expertise across organisations
- Continuously improve, using real-world insight from across the group
This is a partnership with a clear shared direction, shaped by those who deliver and use the system every day. Clinical leaders, digital teams, and programme directors meet regularly through the EMAP Digital Design Collaborative. They share materials, insights, and lessons learned openly, helping each other navigate complexity, avoid common pitfalls, and move forward with greater confidence.
The focus is practical. Conversations centre on real delivery challenges: how to support clinical adoption, structure training, manage data migration safely, and refine workflows so they work in practice. Because the challenges are shared, the solutions are too.
As digital maturity grows, the focus is shifting beyond go-live. Across EMAP, trusts are working together to refine and evolve the system over time. That includes:
- A shared pipeline of enhancements, prioritised for collective benefit
- Communities of practice in areas like urgent and emergency care and EPMA
- Ongoing workflow refinement, based on frontline feedback
- Better use of specialist expertise, wherever it sits across the network
This is how transformation becomes sustainable – through continuous, shared improvement.
Nervecentre’s cloud-based SaaS architecture underpins this approach. It provides a common foundation across organisations, while allowing each trust to tailor the system to its own services and priorities. The result is a joined-up way of working that supports collaboration without removing local control.
When this journey began, Richard Mitchell, EMAP Chair and CEO at University Hospitals of Leicester and Northampton Group, said, “Having a single EPR in place across the region has the potential to unlock radical ambitions. The rapid adoption of digital will continue to transform services at UHL, but it is the opportunity across the East Midlands Acute Providers network – where we are seeing multiple trusts independently choose the same EPR – which has the potential to unlock our radical ambitions. Frontline digitisation is now within reach, and by working together we will transform the patient, colleague and training experience in our region.”
The collaboration is already extending beyond the East Midlands. Trusts in Yorkshire and Sussex using Nervecentre’s EPR are contributing to and learning from the same growing community.
What’s emerging is more than a series of EPR implementations. By working together, these trusts are building the foundations for a more collaborative, responsive, and sustainable model of care that can continue to evolve as needs change. Transformation at this scale is complex, and progress takes time. But what’s happening in the East Midlands shows what becomes possible when organisations align around a shared platform and purpose.
The message is clear: the NHS is embracing a new era of connected care, and Nervecentre is at the forefront, empowering trusts to unlock their “radical ambitions” to move further, faster, and together.
1“Trusts ‘unlock radical ambitions’ with move to same EPR.” HSJ, 8 January 2024, https://www.hsj.co.uk/technology-and-innovation/trusts-unlock-radical-ambitions-with-move-to-same-epr/7036356.article. Accessed 12 February 2024.
