NHS Luton Clinical Commissioning Group and NHS Bedfordshire Clinical Commissioning Group seeks to jointly commission an Integrated Urgent Care (111 & Out of Hours) Service across Luton and Bedfordshire via a ‘Prime Provider’ approach.

Central to this will be a professional Clinical Advice Service offering patients who require access to a wide range of clinicians, both experienced generalists and specialists.

It is essential that these clinicians are supported by the availability of clinical records such as Summary Care Record (SCR) and Enhanced Summary Care Record (ESCR) as well as Electronic Prescribing and other locally available systems.

The IT system must also allow directly bookable urgent appointments into Primary Care GP systems.

The offer for the public will be a single entry point – NHS 111 – to fully integrated urgent care services in which organisations collaborate to deliver high quality, clinical assessment, advice and treatment and to shared standards and processes with clear accountability and leadership.

Therefore the Integrated Urgent Care (111 & Out of Hours) Service should allow movement of patients seamlessly from one element of the system to the other, streamlining the experience for patients, reducing unnecessary waiting and inefficiency.

The Integrated Urgent Care (111 & Out of Hours) Service should not be limited to treating patients, but must also be committed to empowering the population to self-care where appropriate with a focus on education and lifestyle modification.

The new provider will need to plan for online and digital provision in the future in order to make it easier for the public to access urgent health advice and care.

This will increasingly be in a way that offers a personalised and convenient service that is responsive to people’s health care needs when: • They need medical help fast, but it is not a 999 emergency • They do not know who to contact for medical help. • The think they need to go to A&E or another NHSE urgent care service. • They need to make an appointment with an urgent care service. • They require health information or reassurance about how to care for themselves or what to do next.

The estimated Total contract value excluding VAT is £45.5m over 84 months.

The estimated contract duration term is 60 months (estimated contract value £32.5m) plus an option to extend for a further 24 months (maximum of a 7 year contract).

To support the Procurement process Luton and Bedfordshire Clinical Commissioning Groups plans to hold a pre-procurement ‘Market Awareness Provider Event’ in the afternoon on 10th May 2016 at: The Rufus Centre, Steppingley Road, Flitwick, Beds, MK45 1AH.

The purpose of the event will be to discuss at a high level Luton and Bedfordshire joint proposals and to use the knowledge of the market to help inform elements of the service specification.

The procurement process and timetable will also be shared.