EBME
Engineering the connected healthcare estate
The integration of connected medical technologies is reshaping the NHS estate and redefining the role of Electro-Biomedical Engineering (EBME) teams. A Thought Leadership Workshop at EBME Expo explored how engineers, IT specialists and estates professionals can work together to manage the shift.
The Prime Minister has promised to ‘harness game- changing tech’ as part of the 10 Year Health Plan, but what role will EBME departments have in integrating and managing these technologies? As these technologies become increasingly connected, do EBME departments have the skills and knowledge they need to support the government’s ambitions? What will be the impact of technology on patient care and how can clinical engineers ensure they are prepared? Furthermore, as the government seeks to move more care away from hospitals into the community, what challenges will there be from an EBME perspective? How can clinical engineers ensure the remote technology, required to implement the 10 Year Health Plan, will be safe, maintained and effectively connected? These were among the key issues discussed at the Thought Leadership Workshop, held at EBME Expo back in June 2025. Chairing the Workshop was Iain Threlkeld, head of Clinical Engineering, at Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust. He pointed out that UK Trusts are increasingly looking at IT integration. Medical devices are now being linked into the patient record and need to be connected to a plethora of rapidly evolving digital tools and artificial intelligence. The role of the clinical engineer needs to keep pace with this fast-paced changing landscape and the challenges that this presents were explored during the Workshop. Iain Threlkeld asked delegates to consider:
n What developments could be introduced to take advantage of increased connectivity to improve patient care?
n How will integration be managed by the existing workforce?
n What do we need to consider, to get ready for the next steps on the journey?
Integration and connectivity challenges
One delegate commented that patient monitoring technology used at their Trust has been integrated into EPIC software and links into the electronic patient record (EPR). However, one challenge, in particular, has been a lack of training around integration among clinical engineers. “It is not just the mechanical side that we are looking at,” they commented. “When we go to equipment, integration is part of the issue,” they continued. “The training needs to be ‘generic’ in terms of IT, rather than specific to an equipment manufacturer,” they explained.
November 2025 Health Estate Journal 65
Other delegates pointed out that ageing infrastructure (especially within smaller hospitals) is an issue: “The infrastructure is a big challenge… if clinical engineers had some involvement when infrastructure is put in place, we could help negate potential issues, in the future, when we put in new equipment that is more connectivity oriented,” one delegate asserted. Infrastructure is going to require capital planning, but
also “cascades into a lot of other departments which need insight and approval,” they observed.
Importance of monitoring Other challenges included the fact that manufacturers of patient monitoring equipment, and other healthcare technologies, have their own proprietary networking systems.
“Clinical engineers are not trained in how to manoeuvre
or operate these networking systems,” another delegate observed. They explained that this can lead to challenges when a fault occurs – such as monitors not communicating with a central monitor. “You may find the connector, the internet cable, and
all the IT are working fine, and the monitor shows there is a network, but there’s nothing displaying on the central monitoring system. So, you contact your local IT team who say ‘everything is fine’, but when you contact the manufacturer, they give you a whole new story… The
Delegates commented at the Workshop that ageing infrastructure is a big issue.
AdobeStock / Vladislav
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