CIOTech Outlook Team | Thursday, 03 July 2025, 03:13 IST
The UK Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has announced plans to introduce an "innovator passport" in the next 24 months to facilitate the scaling of health technology that has been proven in the NHS.
The passport will be part of the next 10-year NHS health plan that the government is expected to produce, which aims to reduce bureaucracy and increase innovation in healthcare.
The innovative passport will be a single digital approval system, allowing technologies assessed by one NHS organisations to be adopted by others without having to undergo significant re-assessment. This system will be delivered through a platform called MedTech Compass, developed by the DHSC to help make effective technologies available and visible to buyers in the NHS.
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MedTech Compass will help NHS trusts evaluate technologies more quickly by providing clear evidence and allowing for side-by-side comparisons of products. This will streamline procurement and help to accelerate adoption timelines for new innovations.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting noted that the initiative would remove unnecessary repetitive administrative barriers which have historically slowed the way innovations are introduced into the system, stating that these innovator passports will save time and cut down on duplication when the life sciences sector is working with the NHS.
Dr Vin Diwakar, Clinical Transformation Director at NHS England, said, "We’re seeing the impact improvements to technology are having on our everyday lives on everything from smartwatches to fitness trackers – and we want to make sure NHS patients can benefit from the latest medical technology and innovations as well. The new innovator passports will speed up the roll-out of new health technology in the NHS, which has been proven to be effective, so that patients can benefit from new treatments much sooner".
Streeting also pointed out that patients will benefit from having access to medical technologies in a more equitable way, eliminating the "postcode lottery" in the delivery of care. The digitized passport will also assist in creating the NHS as a future-facing health service but will also reduce waste by being able to make integrated decision-making smarter and faster across the system.
