Attain worked with six ICB systems of Primary Care Medical and Optometry providers for a large-scale contractual reissue project, in preparation for ICB handover (from NHSE). All GMS, PMS, APMS, and GOS providers across the East of England region required their contracts renewing to the most recent version, following a lack of capacity and capability within NHSE and CCG-delegated commissioners for the contract management process. Total contract numbers included 539 for GMS, 58 for PMS, 55 for APMS, and 556 for GOS.

What We did

  • Brought together partners and stakeholders, working to understand contractor challenges, LMC concerns and NHSE redlines/limitations, to deliver the required outcome.

  • System level working with all ICB structures within the NHSE structure, as well as in terms of their desired requirements on the level of detail they required to be in the contracts (i.e. over and above core requirements).

  • Established a large-scale contract creation process, based on six model types of GOS contract and three model types of GMS contract.

  • Created an advanced automated approach to develop contracts based on information submissions in a slick, streamlined manner.

Outcomes

  • Updated contractual information and developed the existing GMS contract to account for the shift from CCGs to ICBs, incorporating all required elements to make this a functional contract for the new commissioners.

  • Achieved significant uptake, proven by GMS information returns and contract renewals that have been achieved at over 50% of In Scope practices across the region, and over 40% for GOS.

  • Added much needed capacity and capability within a challenged delivery model. NHSE has significant resource and capability challenges due to several factors, but Attain were able to undertake all the ‘heavy lifting’ and deliver flexible support that met the needs of the project, as well as helping support the broader NHSE primary care team in their roles.