London Sexual Health Transformation Programme: September 2016

Update September 2016

Welcome to the September briefing from the London Sexual Health Transformation Programme.   It has been a busy summer with tenders being published for both the e service and the face to face services.

The Case for Change

We continue to ensure that we are focused on the key drivers that led to the setting up of the collaborative programme in 2014. All decisions and actions are continually checked against these:

Those key drivers remain:   

• The need for sexual health services in London is significantly higher than the rest of the country, and continues to increase
• The noticeable variations in access and activity across boroughs, with residents from across London accessing services in central London
• The significant advantages for London boroughs to work together to transform and commission services 
• The importance of maintaining and improving strong clinical governance, safeguarding and quality assurance arrangements for commissioning open access services

• The need to respond to current and future financial challenges, and make the best use of resources available.

Procurement Progress

The tender for the pan London e service was published on 8th^th August and pre-qualification questionnaire were returned this week.  The timetable now is as follows:

• Following assessment of the PQQ responses, 5 bidders will be invited to participate in the negotiation (ITPN) stage on the 15th September.  Submissions will need to be returned on 20th October
• Following evaluation of these submissions the authorities will then have a period of negotiation from 21st November to 16th December with 3 bidders
• Final tender documents will then be released on 3rd January to be returned 18th January 2017
• We hope to award the contract for the new service mid-February 2017.

Sub Regional procurements are also now progressing swiftly: Inner North West London and North Central London procurements are underway, with Outer North West planning to publish on 16^th September. 

Clinical Event

Unfortunately we had to cancel the meeting planned for the 12^th September.  We’re sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused.  However given the amount of procurement activity going on it felt as if many people were just too busy to commit to half a day.  In addition, we are very aware of the commercially sensitive nature of much of what we are currently doing and didn’t want to compromise this.     

Next Steps for the Programme

The core team are currently thinking through the next steps for the programme.  We are reviewing what has been achieved to date, checking that we are on track for the end of March, and considering what now needs to happen.  Our aim in all of this is to ensure we support boroughs to build on the programme and ensure that an overall system focus is maintained.  Part of this will involve embedding long term governance to aid and progress good system management.   

Channel Shift Group

The channel shift group has been developing ideas to support the behaviour change necessary to make channel shift a success.  The group is considering a number of different options including drafting a specification for external specialist support to test out with some providers.  A soft market questionnaire is being planned with the help of the procurement team at Richmond and a proposal will be presented to the Programme Board in mid-October.   

Sub Regional Updates

Inner North West London

Work continues to develop a communication strategy with both the LSHTP and sub regional PH communication teams.

The service specification, contract, pricing strategy and access agreements have all been signed off by the Local Authority.   In addition, the sub region has agreed ceiling tariffs based on the LSHTP London tariff principles but with efficiencies built in.

Evaluation and Moderation will be concluded by the end of September we will then be making recommendations to councils to progress to award.    

Outer North West London

ONWL invited expressions of interest on the London Tenders Portal on 25 August 2016; the Official Journal of European Union (OJEU) was available 2 days later.  ONWL have only issued the PQQ and an Initial Descriptive Document along with borough information packs at this stage.  The closing date is the 13 September.  We plan to reduce the number of bidders following this process and will be inviting those who have passed the PQQ stage to the negotiation stage.  The Invitation to Participate in Negotiations (ITPN) (comprising of the service specification, contracts, method statement questions and pricing schedule) will be issued on the 21 September.   Deadline 21 October.  If all goes to plan we will award the contract towards the end of the year, with a go-live date in April 2017.

North Central

North Central London has now issued its specification for integrated sexual health services across the sub-region, and is out to tender until 28^th September. 

North East London

An engagement programme is underway on the proposed service model for north east London.  The team is also working to localise sections of the London integrated service specification to ensure it is appropriate for the local population. 

South West London

Boroughs in south west London are carrying out a market testing questionnaire for integrated sexual health services with the aim of procuring a new service for the second half of 2017. 

South East London

As a result of the work of the Lambeth, Southwark, Lewisham and Bromley Sexual Health Transformation Programme the pilot for the new service model for sexual health is just starting at King’s College Hospital and Guy’s and St Thomas’ Hospital. The model is in line with that of the London Sexual Health Transformation Programme and the model that will be delivered across most of London from next year onwards. 

The pilot is rolling out the new model in stages over the next six months. The first stage is a pilot of digital triage at the door.  As part of the pilot, all patients attending are offered help and support at the door to complete the triage process.   

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Please pass this briefing on to anyone who might be interested, and have a look at our website HERE or contact those named below if you have any specific questions.

The next briefing will be issued in the second week of October.  If there are subjects you would like to see covered, or have any comments about the briefing, please let us know.

For further details on the Programme please contact

• Dr Andrew Howe, Programme Director
  • 07535 624828,
  • Andrew.Howe@harrow.gov.uk
• Mary Cleary, Programme Lead
  • 07948 506 584
  • mary.clearylyons@cluthamanagement.com
•  Mark Wall, Communications Lead
  • 0790 999 3278
  • mark@markwall.co.uk