News - week commencing 18 May 2026

The Test Data Self Service Portal (TDSSP) is a powerful test data generation platform that creates realistic synthetic patient records, enabling teams to develop, test and assure digital services without using real patient data.
Built and owned by the DGAT (Data Governance, Assurance and Testing) team, and run day-to-day by the test data team, TDSSP has become a quiet but critical enabler of NHS digital delivery.

The platform has now reached a major milestone, supporting over 1,000 users across the NHS. Its reach spans organisations including Boots, Oracle, EMIS, Hippo, Accenture and System C, alongside a wide range of national NHS service teams, highlighting its growing role across the health and care ecosystem.

For staff, TDSSP removes the friction of sourcing test data, speeding up onboarding and allowing teams to focus on delivery. For patients, it ensures digital services are tested against realistic data before going live, contributing to safer, more consistent care experiences. For the wider NHS, it drives standardisation, improved data quality, and efficiency at scale.
This milestone reflects both the strength of the service and the increasing demand for robust, reusable test data as a core component of modern digital delivery.

There has been a delay to the availability of the OpenAPI Specification (OAS) files for the new Advice and Guidance endpoints.   The OpenAPI Specification (OAS) files will not be available to the previously indicated April timeframe.

We will provide a further update as soon as an expected delivery date has been confirmed.

A new version of the Endpoint Registration (EPR) Software is being released. The release will consist of three phases

Phase1 - A new User Interface

The User Interface has been given a long overdue facelift in line with recent NHSE standards. The functionality remains largely unchanged and is hopefully intuitive.

Phase 2 - Integration with CIS2

EPR is one of the last NHSE systems to migrate to CIS2 Auth. We expect to decommission CIS1 Auth by Feb ’27.

Phase 3 - Java Uplift

The system needs a seismic jump in Java version for security and other reasons.

The general strategy will be to deploy each of these changes into the Path to Live (PTL) environments, Integration and Deployment, every few weeks for testing by internal NHSE teams and any 3^rd parties that use EPR in the PTL environments, then into the Production environment around a month later, assuming we haven’t found any major issues that require extensive rework.

The release schedule is 

• Phase 1 into PTL 6 May – Production 3 Jun​
• Phase 2 into PTL 20 May – Production 17 Jun
• Phase 3 into PTL 17 Jun – Production 15 Jul

When the new versions are deployed, the legacy / prior version will be disabled. We will not be  ‘dual running’ the two alongside each other. In case of severe issues, rollback may be required and this will be advertised on the PTL website. 

Given there are no functional changes to EPR, and much of the uplift is either cosmetic (UI) or transparent (Java), there is not currently any written guidance. 

As part of planned changes to support the introduction of a new Advice and Guidance (A&G) service, the e‑RS INT training environment is being used by the development team to test specific scenarios.This activity will continue until 19 May. During this period, users may experience intermittent downtime or reduced availability.

Where possible, any required updates or outages will be carried out, out of hours, although this may not always be achievable.