Adult ADHD Services for NHS Telford and Wrekin CCG and NHS Shropshire CCG

This notice is to notify the market of the contract award of Adult ADHD Services by NHS Midlands and Lancashire CSU on behalf of NHS Telford and Wrekin CCG and NHS Shropshire CCG.

ADHD is a mental health disorder and patients will already be destabilised by the Covid-19 pandemic and it would be not within the interest of the patients to cause more anxiety by destabilising the incumbent provider, nor would it be deemed clinically good practice. The direct award enables recovery from the pandemic and stability for the patient's health conditions, with the intention of procuring the service in the future.

The service contract shall be for a period of 18 months and will commence on the 1 September 2020.The contract value is estimated to be £818,000.00 over the 18 month contract period. The prevailing NHS standard contract terms and conditions shall apply.

The service aims to provide a specialist assessment and diagnostic service to adults with a suspected ADHD and those with a confirmed diagnosis residing in Shropshire, Telford, and Wrekin.

Service objectives:

• To enable adults with suspected ADHD who do not have a diagnosed learning disability to obtain a timely diagnosis of their condition;
• To provide a local, weekly clinic, for the review and ongoing treatment of complex and non-complex patients, to include prescribing and monitoring;
• To signpost people with ADHD to other agencies and sources of support as appropriate;
• To provide guidance on self-help strategies and recommendations for patients in support of self-care;
• To signpost patients with an unconfirmed diagnosis to appropriate services and support networks.

The adult specialist ADHD service shall provide a local assessment and diagnosis service to support people with suspected ADHD and those with a diagnosis of ADHD to include prescribing.

The service shall aim to complete an assessment within 18 weeks of receiving a referral for an individual.

The provider shall be required to undertake shared care in relation to prescribing medication with the patient's GP, where the GPs have signed up to the shared care agreement.

A Voluntary Ex Ante Transparency Notice was previously published to support this contract award - 2020/S 142-350894, detailing the following reasons for direct award:

• A PIN as a call for competition was issued September 2019, four providers expressed interest and were invited through to the tender stage. During the tender stage only two bids were received and one of the bidders provided written withdrawal. This meant only one suitable tender was received. The procurement was aborted.

• This service is deemed an essential service.The current circumstances within the healthcare environment, Covid-19, could negatively affect patients should change happen now. The incumbent provider Health and Wellbeing Ltd is an SME with the requirement to enter into new lease agreements, therefore the CCG's need to ensure ongoing service stability.

Additional information: A VEAT Notice was published under the Public Contract Regulations 2015. It is for clinical services which are light touch regime services for the purpose of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 as specified in Schedule 3 of the Regulations ('Regulations'). Accordingly, the contracting authority is only bound by those parts of the Regulations detailed in Chapter 3 Particular Procurement Regimes Section 7. The contracting authority is not voluntarily following any other part of the regulations.

As the CCG is a relevant body for the purpose of the National Health Service (Procurement, Patient Choice and Competition) (No 2) Regulations 2013 these regulations also apply to this procurement. All dates, time periods and values specified in this notice are provisional and the contracting authority reserves the right to change these.

Transparency: the contracting authority is subject to the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA) and the Environmental Information Regulations 2004 (EIR) and may be required to disclose information received in the course of this service under FOIA or the EIR. In addition and in accordance with the UK Government's policies on transparency. This service may be subject to possible redactions at the discretion of the contracting Authority. Any redactions, whether in relation to information requests under FOIA, the EIR or policies on transparency will be in accordance with those grounds prescribed under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and the Environmental Information Regulations 2004. Further information on transparency can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/procurement-and-contracting-transparency-requirements guidance.