Innovation needs a new approach
Paul Grover/Rex Features
Lord Darzi is seeking ideas on how policy can drive innovation in
the NHS |
A new approach to innovation in the NHS is needed to enable pharmacy to provide the range of clinical services to which it aspires, according to organisations that represent community pharmacy owners.
In their joint response to the Department of Health’s call for
policy ideas on how to drive innovation in the NHS (part of the Lord
Darzi review), the National Pharmacy Association, the Company Chemists’ Association
and the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee highlight two challenges.
These
are: changing the culture of the NHS, especially around commissioning,
to reward and support informed risk taking; and
removing professional politics from the commissioning process and creating
a more level playing field for new and existing providers.
They identify a number of barriers (see Panel)
and propose several policies that they believe would go some way to
addressing these, including the
introduction of a provider-incentive scheme that builds on the principles
of benefit sharing inherent in
practice-based commissioning and a new commissioning model that engages
everyone as equal partners in service redesign.
Barriers
The barriers to innovation identified are:
• Lack of access to data
to help providers quantify the investment opportunity service
redesign represents
• Lack of certainty around commissioning and contracting, making
investment decisions risky
• Persistence of an uneven playing field for providers, including
within practice-based commissioning
• Lack of incentives to foster collaboration between existing
and new providers |
The organisations also
suggest that commissioners should map the areas in which they are seeking
proposals for service reconfiguration, specifying
any appropriate quality standards that need to be met and the likely
length of contract on offer.
The response also suggests ways in which risk and investment in innovation
can be shared, including offering first wave providers guarantees about
length of contracts following successful pilot implementation.
Commenting on the consultation, Georgina Craig, commissioning
policy lead at the CCA, said: “We welcome the department’s
focus on driving innovation; it can only be a good thing for community
pharmacy.
Commissioning pharmacy services is an innovation in itself. We may be
existing providers, but in the context of many of the services we aspire
to provide, we are new market entrants.”
Access critical
services In its main submission to the Darzi
review, the NPA details two proposals for maintaining access-critical
services
within a well
designed hub-and-spoke model of provision.
The first is a national minor ailment
scheme.
The second is that when consulting on relocation
of care, for example to polyclinics, primary care trusts should
include a neighbourhood access
analysis and consider the potential for expanding community pharmacy-based
services. |
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The
Pharmaceutical Journal
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