Healthcare’s Hidden Bottleneck: Study Finds UK Clinicians Spend Millions of Hours Logging In—And How One Fix Changed Everything

A sweeping new analysis from Imprivata has revealed a staggering inefficiency quietly draining the UK and Ireland’s healthcare systems: clinicians are collectively losing millions of hours each year to login screens. But there’s a twist—when single sign-on and access management (SSO/AM) systems are deployed, the time saved translates into both clinical and financial breakthroughs.

Logging In—or Losing Out

The study, covering 55 hospitals across four nations, represents the largest non-U.S. evaluation of SSO/AM to date. Researchers directly timed login workflows before and after SSO/AM implementation, then mapped those seconds to clinician salaries and patient throughput.

The findings are impossible to ignore: across these hospitals, SSO/AM freed 3.3 million hours of clinician time per year—equivalent to 278,000 twelve-hour shifts—and unlocked £54.1 million ($68.7 million) in annual value. Each facility, on average, gained nearly £1 million in productive time.

“Every second a clinician spends fighting with passwords is a second stolen from patient care,” said Dr. Sean P. Kelly, Chief Medical Officer at Imprivata. “The power of single sign-on isn’t just convenience—it’s giving time back to the bedside.”

Security and Speed, Not a Tradeoff

Healthcare IT teams have long faced a tension between cybersecurity compliance and clinical efficiency. The more systems required for care delivery—EHRs, prescription services, lab portals—the more logins clinicians face, often up to 20 separate credentials per shift.

The study found that SSO/AM implementations cut login times by up to 90%, depending on configuration. In Scotland’s NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde Health Board, where 35 hospitals were analyzed, clinicians gained an average 118 hours per year—the highest in the study. That alone translated to £23.9 million ($30.4 million) in reclaimed value.

Dr. Kelly emphasized that “strong cybersecurity and usability aren’t mutually exclusive. They can reinforce each other when designed right.” Imprivata’s platform requires only one secure two-factor login at shift start, then uses smartcard or proximity authentication for the rest of the day—eliminating the cycle of retyping passwords while preserving compliance with national patient data standards.

Beyond Efficiency: Burnout and Bedside Time

Beyond cost recovery, the human impact may be the most profound. Clinician burnout has become endemic, with digital friction cited among the top causes. By reducing screen-time fatigue, hospitals reported higher satisfaction and workflow continuity.

Dr. George A. Gellert, an external medical advisor to Imprivata, noted that SSO/AM “isn’t about trimming budgets—it’s about redistributing focus. The minutes clinicians save add up to better care, faster decisions, and safer data.”

In some hospitals, this meant staff who once left workstations unlocked out of frustration with login delays could now comply fully with privacy mandates—boosting both cyber hygiene and patient trust.

Scaling Up: A Billion-Pound Opportunity

If the 55 hospitals studied are representative of the broader system, scaling SSO/AM across all eligible facilities in the UK and Ireland could reclaim up to 71 million clinician hours annually—worth between £0.86 and £1.16 billion ($1.09–$1.47 billion) in ongoing productivity.

That’s not a one-time savings—it’s recurring, year after year.

“Clinician time is the most valuable currency in healthcare,” said Daniel Johnston, Senior Director at Imprivata. “This research quantifies what happens when technology gets out of the way.”

The Quiet Revolution in Health IT

For decades, EHR adoption has been a double-edged sword—digitizing care while introducing new complexity. The Imprivata study reframes the conversation: authentication, often treated as a security formality, can itself become a vector for clinical efficiency.

The data suggests that identity access modernization may now be as essential to patient outcomes as diagnostic imaging or digital prescriptions. As health systems confront chronic staffing shortages and cybersecurity threats, tools that simultaneously lighten cognitive load and tighten digital defense could mark the next wave of healthcare innovation.

In short: the login screen may finally be turning into a launchpad.