Telephone and Messaging Based Advice & Guidance Service for Health Professionals

NHS Hertfordshire and West Essex Integrated Care Board (referred to as the Commissioner) invited suitably qualified and experienced providers to express their interest in delivering an Telephone and Message based Advice and Guidance Service to Health Care Professionals across the NHS Hertfordshire and West Essex Integrated Care System.<br/><br/>The key aims and objectives of the digital platform were to enable both telephone based and clinically secure photo messaging application for the provision of Clinical Advice & Guidance for a range of clinical specialties.<br/><br/>The platform will provide a consistent level of stability and importantly a high level of connectivity with exceptional connection times measured in seconds.<br/><br/>The service is able to offer a range of specialties covering both physical and mental health.<br/><br/>The service is integrated with key local providers in HWE Integrated Care System (ICS) but is backed up by a network of NHS clinicians located outside of Hertfordshire and West Essex but within the UK.<br/><br/>The service will allow healthcare professionals to speak to other healthcare professionals locally or where not available to other healthcare professionals based elsewhere in the UK. The service will provide access to these UK based healthcare professionals either through their own network or through a third-party network that they will sub-contract.<br/><br/>This ensures that primary care always has access to immediate clinical advice and guidance.<br/><br/>The provision of healthcare professionals outside of HWE should be in a manner that does not result in a detrimental effect on NHS patients or services, nor diminish the public resources that are available for the NHS.<br/><br/>The service will also be available to other healthcare professionals and organisations within HWE ICS to allow appropriate advice and guidance to be given.<br/><br/>The process was a one stage open process.<br/><br/>The contract is for a period of 3 years with the option to extend for up to a further 2 years, commencing 1st August 2024.<br/><br/>The annual contract value was £600,000 inclusive of VAT (£1,800,000 for the initial 3-year term with an option to extend for a further 2 years totalling £3,000,000 over the total 5 year term).<br/><br/>Please note there was a financial threshold associated with this procurement. Any bids exceeding £600,000 per annum was excluded from evaluation and disqualified from the process. No bids over £600,000 per annum were accepted.<br/><br/>Providers registered for the opportunity via the link below, as detailed: https://health-family.force.com/s/Welcome<br/>Project Reference: C244252<br/>Project Name: Telephone and Messaging Based Advice & Guidance Platform for Health Professionals