Over 20 NHS trusts have ditched Palantir waiting-list tools, analysis shows

More than 20 NHS trusts in England have stopped using Palantir’s waiting list tools, according to FT analysis that casts doubt on widely cited claims about the success of the controversial data project led by the US software giant.

NHS England claims that more than 300,000 patients have been flagged for removal from elective care waiting lists across 40 trusts realising benefits from two hospital co-ordination tools built using Palantir technology.

But FT analysis of freedom of information requests published on transparency website WhatDoTheyKnow found more than half of these trusts no longer used the inpatient or outpatient care co-ordination solutions to manage waiting lists.

The UK statistics regulator told the FT that, in response to the findings, it had opened a new investigation into NHS England’s claims in relation to the Federated Data Platform, the Palantir-built system that underpins the waiting list tools and is aimed at driving efficiencies.

The health service has already been scrutinised by the Office for Statistics Regulation after the FT uncovered a litany of errors in key datasets and revealed that it had quietly added a caveat to the claims on its website.

Palantir said in a statement: “These two tools are typically used most heavily when the software is first installed in a trust because their primary purpose is to clean up legacy data errors so that the trust has a clear picture of who needs to be treated.”

“This is a basic rule for any customer we work with: that before you start to use the software to make an organisation more productive, you make sure that you are working off accurate data,” the company added.

Ministers are searching for a British supplier in case they decide to replace Palantir, which is controversial because of its ties to the US and Israeli defence industries, amid growing pressure to trigger a 2027 break clause in the FDP contract.

The FT’s analysis of the FOI responses also uncovered fundamental flaws in another of NHS England’s key statistics: that 1.2mn patients have been removed from waiting lists using the FDP’s “referral to treatment” tool.

More than 60 per cent of the 31 NHS trusts included in this 1.2mn figure said they could not quantify the benefits of using the tool, while 6 per cent said they did not use it.

A further 16 per cent did not respond to the FOI requests, which were made by Medact, a health campaign group that opposes Palantir’s presence in the NHS.

In their responses, many NHS trusts said it was not possible to directly attribute any waiting list removals to Palantir’s platform. One trust noted that staff were still responsible for processing discharges on existing hospital platforms with the aid of a number of inputs including the FDP.

Another NHS trust said that while the software helped with waiting list management, the removals “would be happening anyway” as staff could already access the information on existing systems.

The findings have amplified concerns that NHS England has misrepresented the data to present the contract, which was awarded in 2023 at a value of £330mn, in a more favourable light.

Martin Wrigley, a Liberal Democrat member of the House of Commons’ technology committee, said: “These overinflated numbers really show the Palantir contract should be cancelled. There are much better UK alternatives.”

NHS England has added disclaimers to a number of its key claims following the initial investigation by the statistics regulator, acknowledging that simple comparisons of performance before and after adoption do not prove the platform’s effectiveness.

Charles Tallack, former head of operational research and evaluation at NHS England, said the FT’s new analysis cast further doubt on the claims.

“By not accounting for what would have happened without the FDP, NHS England’s method overstates its impact,” he said.

The government has commissioned an independent evaluation of the FDP but the findings are not expected until 2029.

NHS England’s data, digital and technology committee has raised concerns about the “slow pace of delivery” across flagship technology programmes including the FDP, the NHS App and plans for a Single Patient Record.

According to board papers published this week, the committee found a “consistent experience of slower than anticipated pace and disjointed projects where we are falling short of our ambition”.

Critics have argued that Palantir’s tools are less good than some existing local systems, such as CIPHA, an NHS programme that uses technology to link health and social care data from more than 2,000 organisations. The software is used across almost 30 per cent of England, according to its supplier Graphnet.

The FDP could be delivered by a series of smaller businesses already providing data-sharing and management solutions to parts of the NHS, they have said, rather than relying on a single supplier.

One senior health service data expert said the FDP should be built by “a network of contracts, with multiple suppliers, orchestrated by a centre that understands the data and the services”.

NHS England said in a statement: “It is right that local NHS organisations are able to select — and test — individual tools in the Federated Data Platform depending on their needs. Nearly 140 NHS organisations across England have reported benefits from the wide range of tools available on the platform, helping join up and improve care for patients.”

Palantir added that the company’s “software is helping to deliver better care, with trusts using it recording 117,000 additional operations, a 14.3 per cent reduction in discharge delays for long-stay patients and a 5.6 per cent improvement in the number of people finding out whether or not they have cancer within 28 days”.

The Office for Statistics Regulation told the FT that it did not regulate claims made by private companies.