NHS England - Improving GPs’ Access to Mental Health Support

NHS Arden & Greater East Midlands Commissioning Support Unit (NHS Arden & GEM CSU) on behalf of NHS England is carrying out a market engagement exercise for the provision of services to improving GPs’ Access to Mental Health Support. The purpose of this PIN is to notify the market of a forthcoming procurement. The procurement will seek to appoint a provider(S) that can deliver a service which can improve access to Mental Health Support.

Increasing pressures in general practice are one of the reasons why GPs leave the profession. NHS England and key partners are currently delivering several initiatives to support General Practice including Supporting Vulnerable Practices, the Workforce Action Plan, the Primary Care Transformational Fund, and a new national Occupational Health (OH) Specification.

In addition to plans to publish a single national Occupational Health specification, which will ensure far greater consistency in the OH support for GPs across the country, Simon Stevens, Chief Executive, announced in September 2015 that NHS England would go further and look to develop additional services to Improve GPs’ Access to Mental Health Support including combatting issues like stress and burnout. We are currently working closely with our partners to scope out what such a service would be, with a view to putting in place a nationally available service in 2016.

Early scoping has informed us that there are several ways which a national service could be delivered; through local providers in different geographies, or by a single lead provider through a hub and spoke structure. There are also several different pathways and services which could be offered to support GP’s Mental Health and Addiction including: •Point of access to the service via various methods i.e. telephone / website;

•alternative methods of access via the internet, social media and people have a response back by a suitably qualified clinician/councillor;

•Initial contact and assessment/consultation with a suitably qualified

clinician/councillor;

•Assessment, intervention, and follow-up short term or long term treatment options;

•Co-ordination of further care or advice and onward referral into other NHS services with the appropriate skills and resources to meet their needs;

•Outreach and leadership in local areas to promote awareness and preventative means to support GPs’ Mental Health.

Additional information: Currently, occupational health services are available across England but there are varying levels of follow-up services and these sometimes do not provide options of treatment for mental health related problems. However OH services is more about establishing consistent occupational health advice and guidance for performers on the National Performers’ List, including some enhanced health assessments as required for their performer responsibilities. NHS England therefore intends to look at options to commission a national service which improves GPs’ Access to Mental Health Support, which goes beyond the specification of OH services; such services has often been referred to as ‘Practitioner Health’ or ‘Physician Health’ services.

If your organisation is interested in providing the services set out above, please

1.Register on the Bravo portal https://ardengemcsu.bravosolution.co.uk/web/login.html To Access the portal:

2.Complete a copy of the market assessment questionnaire which can be found on Bravo by 2.00pm on Wednesday 20 January. (PQQ_185 on the Bravo Portal refers)

Please note: this is purely a market assessment exercise to gather facts on potential providers. The subsequent procurement will be advertised separately and all organisations wanting to participate will need to respond to the procurement advertisement as and when published.

The responses received during the market analysis exercise will not be taken into account in any future evaluation process as part of the formal procurement process.

Please note that THIS IS NOT A PQQ, we are using this functionality within the Bravo portal to communicate with interested parties.

3.State in your response to question ME01 if you would like to request a place at the market engagement event that is scheduled for 2 February 2016 in London.