The second stage of the procurement process in the review of community health and care in B&NES is now complete and both bidders (Virgin Care and the Sirona partnership) have successfully made it through to the third and final stage.
Following a yearlong review of community health and care services in Bath and North East Somerset, involving extensive consultation with thousands of people, the ground breaking ‘your care, your way’ programme will result in a minimum seven year contract to deliver and co-ordinate services covering a current annual expenditure of £69.2 million.
Both bidders faced rigorous assessment by a panel of community champions alongside a range of expert evaluators including commissioners, social workers, GPs, finance managers and IT specialists.
The B&NES CCG have also taken into account references from people who already work with the bidders elsewhere in the country. These include patients, service user groups, CCGs, local authorities and voluntary and community sector organisations.
The CCG will now provide the bidders with a draft version of the contract which they must read carefully and make comments on.
They have deliberately left some spaces in the contract for the bidders to add some further detail. This is their final opportunity to demonstrate how they plan to deliver the priorities identified by the local community.
These priorities include a greater focus on prevention and supporting people to keep themselves healthy, independent and connected to their community for as long as possible.
Local people expect the successful bidder to integrate the workforce and patient records from over 200 services so that everyone in B&NES can have a coordinated, person-centred care plan to improve their overall physical and mental health and wellbeing.
The bidders’ responses will be scored by the community champions and our expert evaluators in early August. The organisation with the highest score at the end of this process will be announced on 18th August and will become the CCG’s preferred bidder.
The preferred bidder will then begin eleven weeks of intensive testing and discussions with the CCG and Council to produce a final business case. The award of the contract will require formal approval from the Council Cabinet and CCG Board at public meetings on the 9th and 10th November respectively.
The improvements that local people have asked for are bold and ambitious. This means a period of transformational change for all whichever organisations are providing services from 1st April 2017.
The CCG and the Council have been planning for this carefully. They will ensure that everyone receiving health and care services in B&NES has continuity of care during this period and experiences clear improvements as the community’s priorities begin to be delivered.
A key part of this review is valuing the workforce; ensuring they have the time, resources and training they need to deliver high quality care for the population.
All health and care professionals involved in the delivery and commissioning of community services will be supported and kept well informed throughout this period and any changes that may impact on them will be made in line with the required processes.