G-Cloud 12 Market Engagement: Video Consultations for East Region

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent immediate need to support delivering secondary care remotely, NHS England and NHS Improvement initiated a significant acceleration of the use of video consulting technology in England. Since April 2020 this work has supported continuity of care across a wide range of secondary care services including acute outpatients, urgent and emergency care, mental health and community services.

The support offer included optional access to secure and scalable video consulting software for 12 months for all NHS trusts and foundations trusts in England.

The nationally supported arrangements will end on 31 March 2021 and as such the East of England is seeking to put in place local access to video consultation software to continue to build on the significant local progress that has been made in implementing video consultation to support the delivery of NHS care.

Going forward, the sustained and increased adoption of video consultation where clinically appropriate and where supported by patient choice will be a significant part of digitising NHS services in the East of England .The further adoption of video consultation to deliver care will also play a significant role in meeting the NHS Long Term Plan commitments around transforming outpatients, supporting patients to choose 'digital first' for their care and playing an role in reducing the NHS's environmental impact through the reduction in patient and clinician travel.

In line with NHS policy direction and in the interests of ensuring a consistent and reliable digital patient experience, the East of England is seeking to identify and procure a licence to access video consultation software that can be used across multiple secondary care NHS organisations within the region. In addition the East of England wants to ensure access to the same video consulting software is also provided under a single contractual arrangement to those organisations that either rely on NHS secondary care providers to support care of patients (such as care homes) and those in the third sector that directly contribute to the care of NHS patients in secondary care.

For clarity and avoidance of doubt this is a market engagement exercise only with those providers awarded to G-Cloud 12. Any procurement exercise, which may be carried out in connection to the needs of the East Region, will be taken up under the G-Cloud 12 Framework.

Additional information:

Opportunity detail can be found by visiting https://eoecph.bravosolution.co.uk and viewing opportunity - project_19112 - Video Consultations - East Region (G-Cloud 12)