# NHS Staff WiFi - an overview

**Category:** [blog](https://bawmedical.co.uk/c/blog/9)
**Created:** 2016-09-29 23:00 UTC
**Views:** 896
**Replies:** 0
**URL:** https://bawmedical.co.uk/t/nhs-staff-wifi-an-overview/49

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## Post #1 by @marcusbaw

I’ve collected together some information about my work over several years on **WiFi in the NHS**

## NHS WiFi Programme

* I’m currently Chair of the NHS Digital WiFi Programme Advisory Group, which is advising on the introduction of pan-NHS free WiFi for staff and patients. Below are some resources explaining more about the Programme, which is in Domain A of the NIB Workstreams.
* NIB Launch: https://www.england.nhs.uk/2015/06/nib/
* Martha Lane Fox recommendations: https://www.england.nhs.uk/2015/12/martha-lane-fox/

### Articles in the press regarding WiFi and the NHS

* http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-35147380
* http://www.digitalhealth.net/infrastructure/47053/hunt:-tech-money-to-go-on-free-nhs-wi-fi
* http://www.computerweekly.com/feature/What-is-stopping-the-NHS-rolling-out-Wi-Fi-access
* https://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/dec/21/every-nhs-building-free-wifi-technology

## NHS WiFi Survey (unofficial)

For 3 consecutive years (2013, 2014, 2015) I ran an NHS WiFi Survey, asking clinicians and other staff in directly patient-facing roles what their experience of WiFi access was in their place of work. This work was done following a conversation on the NHS Hack Day mailing list, in which there was a difference of opinion about what level of WiFi availability there was in the NHS, and we found that there was no existing data about this. So we created a survey to help answer the question.

The [TL;DR](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Too_long;_didn%27t_read) is: **In 2013 about 22% of NHS staff who responded to my survey had access to free WiFi. By 2015 this was getting to around 50%. These figures are now probably out of date, but they are actually the only data available on Staff WiFi in the NHS!**

## 2013

* Detailed information including the questions used, results, mapping created from the data, and more: [May 2013 National NHS Staff WiFi Survey](https://pacharanero.github.io/may-2013-national-nhs-wifi-survey/) sfasfaefa
* [Discussion about the survey](https://www.networks.nhs.uk/discussion/a-lifeboat-for-nhs-managers/33103965) on NHS Networks

## 2014

* Detailed information on the [2014 NHS WiFi Survey](http://www.bawmedical.co.uk/t/september-2014-2nd-national-nhs-wifi-survey/32)
* My presentation about the survey in the Skunkworks at EHI Live 2014 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BcGu7kMHz-I
* [Slides from this presentation](https://pacharanero.github.io/ehilive_nhswifi2014/#/)

## 2015

* The 2015 survey got somewhat swamped by some of my other work - another survey - this time the [Clinical Software Usability Survey](http://usability.digitalhealth.net/). Hence the numbers for the 2015 WiFi Survey were tiny, and probably didn’t add much to the existing data. You should probably ignore them. I did a new presentation at EHI Live 2015 with a [summary of the 2013-2015 findings](https://pacharanero.github.io/nhswifi2015/#/)

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