Out of Hours Health Services - Buckinghamshire

Out of Hours Health services for Buckinghamshire This notice is placed as a Prior Information Notice, and relates only to a pre-procurement market engagement event. Any values stated within this PIN notice are for guideline purposes only and should not be relied upon.

The NHS Clinical Commissioning Groups (“CCGs”) from Buckinghamshire (namely NHS Aylesbury Vale CCG and NHS Chiltern CCG) wish to engage with providers of Out of Hours Health Services with a view to understanding the market interest for such services in Buckinghamshire. The commissioners wish to consider how best to specify and procure Out of Hours services whilst enabling providers to be able to deliver them in a flexible manner, offering patients appropriate choice and providing incentives for providers to continually improve.

The commissioners would also like to maintain sufficient flexibility so that, over time, new entrants providing high quality services can enter the market. Current thinking is that this can be achieved through a mixture of conventional procurement routes and Any Qualified Provider (AQP) contracts.

Any provision would need to be able to interoperate with the Thames Valley-wide NHS 111/Urgent Care Co-ordination Centre that is likely to be procured over the next few months. The scope of Out of Hours services being considered for Buckinghamshire includes: • Home visits • Face-to-face appointments • Operation of an Minor Illness and Injury service at a specified location The current annual contract values for these services total approx. £6M.

In particular the commissioners are keen to understand the market appetite and the perceived benefits and drawbacks for an innovative approach to service provision. To this end the commissioners would like to meet on a one-to-one basis with a range of providers who believe that they can help formulate the approach to market based on their experience of delivering similar services innovatively.

These meetings will take place at a Buckinghamshire location most likely on 18th February 2016. The commissioners reserve the right to short-list organisations to take part in the one-to-one market investigation discussions and consequently not to run a procurement process or otherwise amend its plans.