One system, two trusts: delivering a shared EPR at scale

In June 2025, East Cheshire NHS Trust and Mid Cheshire NHS Foundation Trust went live with a joint, enterprise wide EPR. Locally known as the Digital Clinical System (DCS) programme, it brought together two local, but independent, Trusts for a first of type multi-tenant, cloud hosted, big bang implementation including Electronic Prescribing and Medicines Administration (EPMA). Leadership was shared by the two Trust CEOs and the objective was to promote new ways of working based on the new EPR with the mantra,’It’s not the East way or the Mid way: it’s the DCS way’. Danny Roberts, CIO of East Cheshire NHS Trust, will describe the implementation journey, including the importance of building strong supplier relationships and aligning the whole organisation with the transformational change programme. The Trusts recognise that they are at the beginning of the EPR journey but know that by working together they have achieved more than if they had tried to do it alone.