Navigating through procurement frameworks in healthcare

Dr Ahmed Shahrabani,
Co-Founder

Procurement frameworks provide a streamlined solution to sourcing ideal suppliers for your business needs. Whether you’re looking for the latest in patient care innovations or to optimise your rostering, using key frameworks is the best way to digitise your organisation.

Benefits of NHS procurement frameworks

Such framework agreements are commonplace within public sector organisations including the NHS. Whilst they reduce time and therefore procurement costs, frameworks also provide a simpler solution to sourcing digital software.

Procuring tech is no easy feat with many suppliers promoting their products as the most effective solution. However, with an NHS procurement framework, stakeholders can benefit from automatic reassurance that all vendors are of the highest quality.

Suppliers go through strict and rigorous selection criteria before qualifying for a place on a framework. All required technical specifications must be met before they can be vetted and deemed credible to potential buyers.

Additional benefits include:

● Reduction of required resources and therefore overall procurement costs

● Better long-term value is achieved with fixed supplier pricing

● A faster contract award and implementation process

● Access to accredited, specialised digital solutions

● A better buyer-supplier relationship with integrated models of care

In this article, we share the top three NHS procurement frameworks that provide a secured route to accessing innovative tech solutions.

Government Digital Service (GDS) Digital Marketplace

The Digital Marketplace is an online platform provided by the UK Government for all public sector organisations including healthcare and agencies. The G-Cloud framework has a wide selection of over 31,000 technology services divided into three categories, or lots: cloud hosting, cloud software and cloud support. Users can search for and assess results within the framework to choose the most suitable supplier according to their budget and requirements.

The marketplace was designed to challenge the traditional ways of purchasing digital services, built with the user in mind. Simpler forms of contracting and an open market approach provides a usable, simple shop window of vetted suppliers. This has reduced barriers to entry for smaller organisations, allowing more SMEs to grow and compete against bigger enterprises.

By using the Digital Marketplace, stakeholders can therefore benefit from access to innovative suppliers and specialised services that provide a solution to their particular need such as accredited workforce technology. This results in a competitive, evolving market of experts with fair value and a fully compliant purchasing process.

NHS Health Systems Support (HSS) Framework

Unlike the Digital Marketplace, the Health Systems Support (HSS) Framework is dedicated purely to the NHS. This provides an easy and quick route to accessing innovative digital services from leading third-party suppliers such as clinical pathways and treatment technology.

Registered vendors must demonstrate fair pricing and a stable financial position before passing strict selection criteria. Their services are then categorised into one or more of the framework’s ten lots that are structured around infrastructure, intelligence, and impact and intervention. Suppliers can only bid on procurements that fall into their accredited lot.

The framework particularly focuses on support services that deliver population health management capabilities. This includes advanced analytics, system reform and digital transformation advances that can help clinicians understand and manage public health.

Any NHS organisation can benefit from the HSS framework including NHS Trusts, CCGs, local authorities, national Arm’s-Length Bodies and various public sector bodies in health and social care.

HealthTrust Europe (HTE)

HealthTrust Europe (HTE) is a niche procurement framework provider that specialises in accredited collaborative staffing solutions for the NHS and other public sector organisations. By using HealthTrust Europe’s NHS procurement frameworks, organisations can benefit from reduced agency spend, accessible placement of healthcare professionals and operate in line with the NHS People Plan.

A rigorously approved supplier list is free to access, having been audited based on criteria set by the NHS. Each vendor must ensure:

● All flexible workers meet the required NHS employment check standards

● A full end-to-end bank service is provided including implementation and project management support

● Shared bank staff solutions are provided where possible across national NHS organisations to reduce spend

The latest launch of the framework - Total Workforce Solutions (TWS) Lot 2 Managed and Collaborative Bank Services - aims to offer strategic support to the end user, enable the implementation and development of a tailored, managed or collaborative bank solution. Such a solution is provided by the Digital Collaborative Bank (DCB), which enables cross-covering of shifts across a growing number of NHS Trusts. The group’s shift fill rate (amount of vacant shifts covered by clinicians) is consistently 5-10% higher than the average Trust working independently, reaching a record-breaking 91% shift fill rate at the height of the pandemic.

The DCB has already placed over 80,000 roles into the National Health Service by enabling total workforce mobility, saving millions spent on agency costs as well as improving patient continuity of care.

The solution directly addresses key issues raised in the NHS People Plan including the challenge of recruiting and retaining healthcare professionals. By making shifts more visible and encouraging collaborative working, NHS Trusts can ensure they have the right staff with the right skills at all times. Find out more about the features and capabilities of collaborative working in a library of content dedicated to this innovative staff bank model.

The Digital Collaborative Bank which started as a grassroots project led by Ashford & St Peter’s Hospitals NHS FT and the Royal Surrey NHS FT is enabled by Locum’s Nest, which connects healthcare professionals to vacant work within the NHS. The DCB currently consists of 9 NHS Trusts, spanning across 4 ICS/STPs, sharing a pool of over 5,000 HR-compliant clinicians.