Health is information-intensive, generating huge volumes of data every day. Health and social care workers spend a significant amount of their time handling information, collecting it, looking for it and storing it. It is therefore very important that information is managed in the most effective way possible in order to ensure a high-quality safe service.

Safe, reliable healthcare depends on access to, and the use of, information that is accurate, valid, reliable, timely, relevant, legible and complete. For example, when giving a patient a drug, a nurse needs to be sure that they are administering the appropriate dose of the correct drug to the right patient and that the patient is not allergic to it.