FirstLight - University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust (UHL), in partnership with St Vincents Consulting and Purple Beard
Synopsis
Ambition
Building digital skills for the NHS of tomorrow
When University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust (UHL) became the first NHS organisation to deploy the NerveCentre EPR system, it faced an unprecedented challenge: how to build the digital expertise needed to configure, support, and evolve a first-of-type system for patient care. The specialist skills required were rare—even outside the NHS—making long-term reliance on costly contractors inevitable unless a new approach was taken.
A new model for workforce sustainability
Recognising this risk, UHL’s Chief Technology and Innovation Officer worked with its trusted partner St Vincents Consulting, the EPR delivery specialist behind the system’s implementation, to create a bold solution. Together they conceived FirstLight—a regional academy designed to identify and grow the next generation of NHS digital professionals.
From concept to collaboration
St Vincents joined forces with Purple Beard, an award-winning ed-tech provider, to co-design an 18-month apprenticeship scheme built around Department of Health standards. The programme taps into under-used local apprenticeship-levy funds, including a £160,000 levy gift from Leicester City Council. It combines a 12-week intensive bootcamp with blended on-site and virtual learning. Candidates—many recent graduates and career changers—are drawn from the local labour market through Job Centre campaigns and direct interviews.
A pathway with purpose
Apprentices start their journey employed by St Vincents, rotating through core disciplines such as Business Analysis, Configuration, Testing, Data & Reporting, and Integration, before transferring into UHL as substantive Band 4 NerveCentre Solution Technicians. The model ensures each apprentice gains not just classroom knowledge but live experience supporting real NHS systems.
Replicable and scalable
Designed for replication across EMAP partner Trusts—including Chesterfield Royal, Kettering General, Northampton General, Nottingham University Hospitals, Sherwood Forest, Derby and Burton, UHL and United Lincolnshire Teaching Hospitals—FirstLight provides a blueprint to support regional workforce transformation.
Ambition realised
By combining education, technology, and social value, FirstLight turns digital transformation into a local employment opportunity—ensuring that the skills to run tomorrow’s NHS are grown within today’s communities.
Outcome
Delivering measurable results and regional momentum
The FirstLight programme is already demonstrating tangible impact. At UHL—supported by Northampton General Hospital—seventy individuals applied for the inaugural bootcamp; twenty were accepted, seventeen completed, and fifteen advanced into full apprenticeships. Each apprentice rotates through key EPR functions, developing practical skills that align directly to live operational needs.
Real workforce outcomes
Eighty per cent of bootcamp graduates have progressed into the 18-month apprenticeship, and over 95 per cent rated the teaching and support as “Outstanding.” Every participant reported increased confidence, job readiness, and understanding of digital healthcare processes. The programme has a strong equity footprint—forty per cent female, ten per cent neurodiverse, and half previously unemployed—contributing directly to local levelling-up goals.
Sustaining future capability
Apprentices are embedded within live functional teams, supporting configuration, testing, and reporting functions four days per week, while dedicating one day to structured training. This hybrid approach ensures immediate productivity and long-term retention. UHL anticipates that at least 80 per cent of participants will transition into substantive NHS roles, securing the Trust’s future EPR skill base.
Regional collaboration and scalability
As part of the East Midlands Acute Providers (EMAP) network—comprising Chesterfield Royal Hospital, Kettering General, Northampton General, Nottingham University Hospitals, Sherwood Forest Hospitals, Derby and Burton, UHL, and United Lincolnshire Teaching Hospitals—the FirstLight model is being evaluated for expansion across all eight Trusts. This would create a region-wide, self-sustaining NerveCentre support resource, reducing external spend and supporting national digital priorities.
Early evidence of success
Feedback from participants, mentors, and operational leads highlights improved digital literacy, stronger team morale, and faster adoption of EPR workflows. Apprentices contribute meaningful capacity to IT, data, and clinical-systems teams from month three onwards.
A foundation for replication
With Purple Beard’s blended-learning platform and St Vincents’ governance framework, FirstLight is fully portable. Other NHS Trusts have already enquired about adopting the model as a regional digital-skills academy, proving that a home-grown workforce approach can meet one of the NHS’s most persistent digital challenges.
Value
Building value through people, not procurement
FirstLight demonstrates that the most powerful digital investment is in people. By cultivating in-house skills instead of relying on short-term contractors, UHL and its partners are achieving both financial and operational sustainability.
Quantified savings and long-term benefit
Independent analysis shows that ten substantive Band 4 staff cost approximately £360,000 per year (including on-costs), compared with more than £1.06 million for equivalent contract resource at £400 per day plus VAT—an annual saving of around £696,000. As the programme scales, these savings will multiply across EMAP Trusts while embedding digital capability that remains in the NHS.
High-impact learning outcomes
The data speaks for itself:
- 80 % of bootcamp graduates progressed into apprenticeships.
- 95 % rated teaching and support as Outstanding.
- 100 % felt job-ready at completion.
- 40 % women, 10 % neurodiverse, 50 % previously unemployed – promoting diversity and inclusion.
Driving transformation and social value
This blend of skills development and social inclusion ensures FirstLight delivers measurable community benefit. It creates high-quality digital careers in Leicester and the East Midlands, directly contributing to NHS England’s priorities for levelling-up and widening participation in the digital workforce.
A model for national value creation
By aligning apprenticeship pathways to the live needs of a first-of-type EPR, the partnership has created a blueprint for future NHS workforce development—bridging education, employment, and innovation. As additional Trusts deploy NerveCentre or similar EPRs, FirstLight offers a proven approach that reduces financial risk, strengthens resilience, and builds a shared skills base across regions.
More than cost savings
Beyond the numbers, FirstLight empowers people who might otherwise be excluded from digital careers. Each graduate becomes an ambassador for NHS innovation—helping the system grow its own digital experts and reducing dependency on expensive contractor markets.
Involvement
Collaboration that delivers capability
Three core partners underpin FirstLight: University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust, St Vincents Consulting, and Purple Beard. From inception, UHL’s Chief Technology and Innovation Officer recognised the need to mitigate the risks of deploying a first-of-type EPR by building sustainable skills internally.
Joint design and shared accountability
St Vincents Consulting led programme governance, drawing on its NHS transformation expertise to ensure alignment with the Department for Education’s apprenticeship standards. Purple Beard provided e-learning innovation and delivery infrastructure, ensuring the content was accessible, interactive, and outcome-driven. Together, the partnership secured £160,000 in levy-gift funding from Leicester City Council to support bootcamp and apprenticeship delivery.
Comprehensive learning architecture
The 18-month programme comprises twelve core modules totalling 340 hours of virtual training, complemented by four days per week of supported on-the-job learning. Each apprentice is mentored by a St Vincents subject-matter expert, coached by a Purple Beard reviewer, and supervised day-to-day by an NHS team leader.
Learning through doing
This tri-layered support structure ensures consistent quality, personal development, and real-world contribution. After fifteen months, apprentices compile a professional portfolio before undertaking a twelve-week end-point assessment project. Successful completion leads to formal graduation and transfer to substantive NHS employment.
A learning partnership built for scale
Beyond the pilot cohort, UHL and St Vincents are collaborating with other EMAP Trusts to extend FirstLight as a shared regional academy. The model’s adaptability allows local tailoring to workforce needs—whether for EPR, integration, data, or cyber-security roles—while maintaining a common quality framework.
Continuous improvement
Ongoing reviews between the three partners capture lessons learned, ensuring each cohort evolves with NHS digital priorities. This dynamic feedback loop is what makes FirstLight not a one-off project but a living, growing academy for the NHS digital workforce.
Spread
Lighting the way beyond Leicester
FirstLight was designed for replication from day one. With its modular structure and apprenticeship foundation, the programme can be adapted to address digital-skills gaps across multiple NHS Trusts, regions, and disciplines.
Regional alignment through EMAP
UHL, St Vincents, and Purple Beard are collaborating with the East Midlands Acute Providers (EMAP) group—Chesterfield Royal, Kettering General, Northampton General, Nottingham University Hospitals, Sherwood Forest, Derby and Burton, UHL and United Lincolnshire—to explore an East Midlands FirstLight Academy. This would provide a shared talent pipeline supporting the NerveCentre EPR and broader digital-transformation programmes.
Supporting national ambitions
The model directly aligns with NHS England’s ten-year digital strategy: transitioning from analogue to digital, creating regional centres of excellence, and promoting a sustainable technology workforce. Beyond EPR support, the framework could expand into new hospital build programmes, analytics, and cyber security.
Addressing structural workforce challenges
By creating localised, stable employment, FirstLight reduces the NHS’s reliance on transient contractor markets. It provides career growth pathways that retain knowledge within organisations, cutting repeat recruitment and training costs. Each cohort strengthens not just technical capability but organisational culture.
Social and economic benefit
FirstLight contributes to social-value objectives by helping under-represented groups enter long-term employment. Its community-based recruitment approach supports inclusive growth in Leicester and the wider East Midlands—demonstrating how digital innovation can also drive economic regeneration.
Scalability and export potential
The model’s governance, curriculum, and quality-assurance framework make it transferable beyond EMAP. International interest is emerging from healthcare organisations seeking to replicate its blend of technical training and workforce sustainability.
The next step
The partners aim to formalise the FirstLight Academy as a regional centre for digital excellence, supporting Trusts throughout their digital journeys and providing enduring capability for decades to come.
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Authors
University Hospitals of Leicester
St Vincents Consulting
