Nearly 40 people attended three webinars set up to provide people with information about the North West London urgent treatment centre (UTC) service procurement currently underway and answer any questions that they had.
Olivia Clymer, Head of Community Engagement & Partnerships at NHS North West London, said: “We were very pleased that so many people wanted to know about the urgent treatment centre procurement. They asked a lot of very insightful and challenging questions and the information gained will be used to influence the procurement moving forward.
NHS North West London (NHS NW London) wants someone to provide urgent treatment centre (UTC) services across:
- Ealing, Northwick Park, Central Middlesex UTCs (London North West University Healthcare NHS Trust).
- Hillingdon Hospital UTC, (The Hillingdon Hospital NHS Foundation Trust).
- St Mary’s Hospital UTC, (Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust).
- West Middlesex Hospital UTC, (Chelsea and Westminster NHS Foundation Trust).
The current contracts for provision end on 31 November 2022. We expect the new providers to be in place in early 2023. This will allow us to provide continuity of service provision over the busy early winter period and holiday season.
During the webinars a lot of questions were raised but the main focus of conversations were:
- The quality of the service and how it connected to the hospital’s emergency department.
- Wanted reassurance that whoever ran the service if the future had a true understanding of the diverse local communities they care for. For example, in North West London we have many refugee communities who have suffered trauma before coming to this country and it’s is good to understand how this needs to impact on the care provided.
Olivia, added: “The feedback received will also be provided to bidders so it can help inform their bid and be used as prompts in the competitive dialogue that will be used as part of the evalutation process.”
The actual evaluation will be delivered by a panel assembled by the NW London ICS which will represent various subject matter experts and stakeholders. The panel comprises:
- four clinical & quality leads
- three GPs and a Nurse
- two operational leads
- a contracting and finance lead
- IT lead
- HR/ workforce lead
Two patient representatives have also been identified to be part of the process along with a subject matter on sustainability. To strengthen the impartiality of the process, GP’s who work outside of NW London and have no involvement in this sector are being used.
A FAQ has been developed based on the conversations has and this will be shared with all attendees and is published here.