NHS England has amended its public communications about the performance of Palantir Technologies’ software following a review by the UK statistics watchdog. The Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) found that NHS England had not sufficiently qualified claims regarding the effectiveness of Palantir’s Federated Data Platform (FDP), prompting the health service to add a clearer caveat to its main webpage.

The investigation was initiated after concerns were raised about widely cited statistics suggesting that the software had contributed to 110,000 additional hospital operations and a 15 percent reduction in discharge delays. The OSR’s probe followed revelations that NHS England had quietly appended a caveat to the data methodology webpage, which noted that causation could not be established because other variables were not accounted for. Further scrutiny uncovered data irregularities, with some hospitals admitting errors related to the discharge delay figures.

In response to the OSR’s review, NHS England agreed to make the caveat more prominent across its communications and to increase transparency by publishing disaggregated data at the individual trust level. The regulator emphasized the importance of presenting statistics in a way that is accurate and transparent, especially when cited by ministers or official briefings. It highlighted that several complaints about NHS England’s initial claims had triggered the assessment to ensure compliance with the government’s statistical code of practice, which prioritizes trust and quality in public data.

Palantir, whose contract with NHS England for the project is valued at £330 million and has drawn scrutiny due to the company’s links to the U.S. defense sector, acknowledged the OSR’s findings. The company noted that while the watchdog’s concerns about uncontrolled variables are valid, the data indicates improvements in key areas where the platform has been deployed. Specifically, Palantir highlighted the reported increase in operations, reduction in discharge delays for long-stay patients, and a 6.8 percent improvement in the speed of cancer diagnoses against NHS targets.

NHS England stated that it welcomed the OSR’s review and confirmed it was implementing all recommendations to enhance clarity and transparency regarding the FDP’s reported benefits. The ongoing evaluation of the contract by regional authorities, including those led by Andy Burnham, is expected to consider the findings as they decide on the platform’s future use across the health service.