Arden & GEM has been providing effective support services to NHS England direct commissioning since 2013.
During this time, we have amassed extensive experience in supporting direct commissioning functions at a national and regional level with business intelligence, strategic clinical procurement and a variety of other commercial solutions. This has enabled the effective commissioning of specialised, secondary care dental, health and justice, armed forces and public health section 7a services.
Our award-winning collaborative work with specialised services, which accounts for 90% of direct commissioning spend, has helped to inform planning, improve access, deliver savings and monitor quality.
The process of delegating some directly commissioned services from NHE England to Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) is underway and is currently expected to progress in accordance with the following timelines:
| Commencement date | Service details |
| April 2023 | All ICBs will take on responsibility for commissioning secondary care dental services |
| April 2024 | Some specialised services (those identified as suitable and ready for delegation) will be subject to service delegation and potentially public health section 7a |
| April 2025 | A further cohort of specialised services are expected to be subject to delegation |
The legal establishment of ICBs in July 2022 addresses the ambition of giving systems responsibility for managing local population health needs, tackling inequalities and addressing fragmented pathways of care. Our experience in supporting direct commissioning provides an opportunity to translate this knowledge and insight to our work with both ICBs and providers to deliver integration which improves service quality and patient outcomes. We can support ICBs in understanding the scope and scale of delegated commissioning and maximising value for their entire population.
Our support includes:
- Delegated commissioning due diligence – supporting systems in readying themselves for service delegation. This includes sharing insights regarding service provision, supporting data flows and business intelligence. Support with the development of commissioning frameworks, programme management for implementation and completion of key assurance documentation necessary for delegation.
- Clinical analytics – connecting national and local data flows, clinical registries and input from subject matter experts to help ICBs, clinical networks and programmes of care better understand clinical pathways and opportunities for improvement
- Optimising procurement of medical devices – by leveraging clinically-led, evidence-based consolidation of device usage to enable more cost-effective procurement, providing challenge to device procurement behaviours and seeking to optimise clinical outcomes for patients.
Our support can be delivered at a national, regional, system and organisational footprint with programme management experts on hand to ensure effective implementation.
Our key strengths and expertise:
We combine expertise across data, analytics, finance, procurement, contracting, clinical leadership and medicines optimisation, bringing together multidisciplinary teams that are able to complement your existing capacity and capability.
Our business intelligence and commercial teams have worked closely with national and regional direct commissioning services for over nine years, giving them a unique understanding of the sector and its challenges.
We are able to share learning and best practice across regions and systems to transform care, including for small cohorts of patients with complex needs.
Service benefits
Our direct commissioning solution will help you to:
- Better connect the pathway of care between specialised, primary, community and secondary services
- Invest in interventions that achieve best value for your population with the greatest impact on outcomes
- Design holistic care that centres on patient need
- Improve service quality.
ADDITIONAL SERVICES
RELEVANT READING
Find out more about our work to support direct commissioning through the resources below.
Delegating specialised commissioning: what ICBs should consider ahead of April 2024
Ayesha Janjua and Iain Stewart look at the key tasks facing ICBs as they take on responsibility for commissioning many specialised services in April 2024, in this latest blog for Healthcare Leader.
Implementing delegated commissioning of Pharmacy, Optometry and Dentistry services in the North West and Midlands
Iain Stewart, Programme Director, and Ayesha Janjua, Associate Director of Leadership and OD, draw together their experience of supporting a network of 11 ICBs in the Midlands region as well as three ICBs in the North West to take on commissioning of pharmacy, optometry and dentistry services from NHS England.
Facilitating the delegation of healthcare services from NHS England to ICBs in the Midlands region
In January 2023, NHS Arden & GEM was engaged by NHS Nottingham and Nottinghamshire ICB to facilitate the delegation of commissioning responsibilities for several primary and secondary healthcare services from NHS England to eleven Midlands ICBs.
Arden & GEM to host NICOR clinical audits & registries
On Friday 24 June 2022, the hosting of all NICOR clinical audits & registries (National Institute for Cardiovascular Outcomes Research) will transfer to NHS Arden & GEM CSU from Barts Health NHS Trust.
Arden & GEM and Highly Specialised Commissioning win at HCSA Awards
Arden & GEM and NHS England Highly Specialised Commissioning have been named winners of the Health Care Supply Association (HCSA) Cross Functional Collaboration Award 2020.
Improving quality of life for adults with chronic pancreatitis
NHS England partnered with NHS Arden & GEM’s procurement team to successfully appoint four centres to deliver complex surgery for adults experiencing severe pain due to chronic pancreatitis.
Arden & GEM and NHS England win at the CIPS Excellence in Procurement Awards 2020
Arden & GEM and NHS England win the ‘Best Collaborative Teamwork Project’ category at the CIPS Excellence in Procurement Awards 2020
Transforming the lives of babies with spina bifida through pioneering prenatal surgery
When NHS England Highly Specialised Commissioning sought to establish a service to provide pioneering prenatal surgery for foetuses with open spina bifida, a collaborative procurement project with NHS Arden & GEM CSU was initiated.
Using public procurement to improve specialised healthcare services
Neli Garbuzanova, Senior Procurement Manager at Arden & GEM, explains how early strategic use of procurement can benefit specialised commissioning in this latest article for Specialised Commissioning journal.
Improving access to pioneering brain surgery for deaf children
Arden & GEM’s award-winning procurement team was selected to work in close partnership with NHS England, clinical experts and patient representatives to award a three-year contract to establish an Auditory Brain Implantation service to enable profoundly deaf children to hear.
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