Implementing the National Programme for IT: what can we learn from the Scottish experience?

The National Programme for IT (NPfIT) promises to revolutionise the delivery of health care by enabling seamless and secure electronic exchange of clinical information within the NHS. Challenges to NPfIT highlighted in the media and academic commentary are common to such initiatives worldwide. This paper offers key messages and recommendations derived from a comparable electronic clinical communications programme in Scotland, and elsewhere, as a means to aid the implementation process