Update on the urgent care procurement exercise by Outer North East London Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) – Alan Steward – Chief Operating Officer, Havering CCG.
Minutes:
The chief operating officer of Havering CCG explained that the way in which people currently accessed urgent care services in Outer North East London was very complicated. The four local CCGs therefore wished to improve this system.
At present, there were a large number of different providers of urgent care across the four boroughs. The procurement exercise would cover services including NHS 111 and the GP put of hours service. All walk-in centres in NHS London would also be included with the exception of that at Barking Community Hospital where a new contract had recently been put in place.
Work on the procurement exercise was in progress with stakeholders including Councils, CCGs and patient engagement forums. Each CCG also had a lay member for patient and public involvement.
The priority for any new services procured was that they be of high quality and clinically safe. Services should also be responsive to patient needs and provide a seamless service. It was not possible to continue with the existing system. The CCGs therefore wished to procure an innovative service. Any successful bidder would also have to demonstrate that it had strong public and patient involvement. This would also apply to any sub-contractors involved.
A process of competitive dialogue would be used during the procurement which would allow bidders to show how they would take services forward. It was anticipated that final bids for the urgent care service would be submitted to the CCGs by April 2015. It was hoped the successful bidder would be announced by July with the new service starting in September 2015. Should a period of formal consultation be required, it was possible that these dates would need to be amended.
The chief operating officer agreed that it was critical that patients and the public were engaged in the procurement process. Patient engagement forums had been asked what they felt were the key elements of the urgent care pathways and these forums would be involved in the decision making process. The CCGs felt that the procurement was an exciting opportunity to resolve issues in urgent care.
The CCGs were keen to bring data together to understand patient flows across the system. It was confirmed that discussions had been held with the patient engagement forum in Havering and that consultation with patient groups in all boroughs would be ongoing.
It was explained that not many places in the UK had previously undertaken reprocurement on this scale, across the whole of the pathway. The appointment of a consortium of providers was therefore a possibility. A lead provider would however be expected to be appointed to take the lead with other organisations. This would include work with GPs, the local Hospitals Trust etc. A final specification for the urgent care services would be developed by the end of March.
An estimate of the proportion of A&E attendees who would be better placed in urgent care was 25-30% (not including Waltham Forest) and figures could be provided for the proportion in the different A&E departments. It was not possible to guarantee that services would remain in precisely the same locations as currently as this depended on the proposals received from providers.
Some consultation events had only been held in the daytime thus far but the CCGs were attempting to address this by e.g. holding stakeholder events during the evening.
The CCGs were already looking at sharing patient records across the system and would look at provider proposals around this. It was not possible at this stage to determine what proposals would constitute a significant change to local services and hence require a period of formal consultation. The detailed service proposals would need to be considered before this could be decided. Four bids had been received this far from organisations in both the NHS and private sector. Due to reasons of commercial confidentiality, it was not possible to give any further details at this stage.
Bids had been made to the Prime Minister’s Challenge Fund around data sharing of care records but the chief operating officer would look into the Pioneers Project of the Better Care Fund as a potential alternative source of funding.
The Committee NOTED the position.