NHS England Warns GPs After Website Vendor Collapse

NHS England has issued an unusual warning to general practitioners following the collapse of Silicon Practice Digital Health Solutions, a health tech firm owned by Schappit Ltd. According to reporting from The Register, the vendor has gone into administration, resulting in some GP websites going offline and disrupting services for potentially hundreds of practices across the UK.

Kevin Humphries, the CTO of NHS England, wrote to practices and health organizations to outline urgent mitigation priorities. These include identifying ways to preserve historical patient information that was not transferred to clinical systems, managing online consultation backlogs, and establishing alternative patient access channels. Humphries also advised practices to determine if they have a legal obligation to notify the Information Commissioner's Office regarding the recoverability, integrity, confidentiality, or availability of personal data.

While NHS England provides guidance, the responsibility for GP IT service arrangements—including cyber security, data security, and business continuity—rests with Integrated Care Boards. Humphries stated that these bodies must lead recovery plans and help impacted organizations assess their disaster recovery protocols.

As practices struggle with increased workloads and the loss of digital communication, Marcus Baw, an open-source tech campaigner and GP, has released a free, open-source website template. Baw stated the template follows NHS web standards and allows practices to regain in-house control of their websites using Claude Code.

Questions regarding the due diligence performed before Schappit Ltd was added to a government framework in July are expected to follow the incident, as reported by The Register.