Genmed announced on 30th June, that it had been selected by London North West Healthcare NHS Trust as its preferred HMRC compliant vendor-neutral managed services partner. The appointment was by mini competition under the SBS managed services provider framework and is initially for a three year period with an option to extend by agreement.
London North West Healthcare NHS Trust (LNWH) is one of the largest integrated care trusts in the country bringing together acute hospital and community services across Brent, Ealing and Harrow. With an operating budget of £743.6 million, it employs 9,500 staff, serves a diverse population of approximately 950,000 people and is responsible for Central Middlesex, Ealing, St Mark’s and Northwick Park Hospitals. The Accident & Emergency department at the Northwick Park site is thought to be the largest in Europe.
Vince Pross, LNWH’s associate director of procurement, explains, “The Trust currently has a small number of services delivered using a managed services contract model but wishes to expand this considerably to now include various priority areas such as endoscopy trust-wide, surgery, anaesthesia, LED lighting, imaging and cardiology, air-conditioning, fire alarm maintenance and electronic document management. Genmed was selected as it can support us in all our priority areas.”
Genmed has an established and proven track record of success providing managed services to the NHS to help trusts address the current lack of additional capital available.
Genmed will work in partnership with LNWH to manage the procurement process on its behalf in the above priority areas. This will include running mini competitions, selecting suppliers in conjunction with clinical input, and managing the whole delivery, administrative and invoicing process.
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The costs for these managed services will then be packaged using an umbrella contract and billed monthly or quarterly. This approach improves cash management as no big upfront investment is required from LNWH and the costs are ‘smoothed’ over time.
Also, Genmed’s services are off balance sheet and HMRC compliant for VAT recovery. This will allow LNWH to reclaim back the VAT so that budget can be saved or money used to fund additional front line services.
Robin Modak, Genmed’s chief executive officer, says, “Most managed service providers focus solely on transactions. They’ll just source and supply equipment. Genmed is different as our approach is much broader. We’re more consultative and will work with Trusts like LNWH to not only procure services cost effectively and efficiently, but fully understand their operational and clinical needs, STP planning goals and look at how we can, therefore, add real value with service provision to improve the patient’s pathway and care provided.”
The genmed approach is closely aligned with all the key directives highlighted by Lord Carter of Coles in his report to improve the efficiency of hospitals.
Genmed works with best of breed suppliers with a track records of success in the NHS
The LNWH brief for managed services is broad. To deliver this, Genmed is vendor neutral and will work with LNWH to select partner firms and OEMs who will fulfil the Trust’s requirements at the right price.
For example, one of LNWH’s areas of focus is electronic document management (EDMS). Genmed partners with leading bureaus, BPO and records management firms including Restore, the largest UK owned archive document storage company who works with over 40% of all NHS Trusts providing records management and scanning services.
In addition, Genmed announced a partnership in February 2017 with CCube Solutions, a leading EDMS software vendor, to use the managed services approach to cover all costs required to shift from paper to digital medical records so that the heath service meets the Government’s deadline that they should be paperless at the point of care by 2023.
To close a medical library and go paperless typically costs more than £1 million. A managed service means a Trust can close a library, get rid of the paper and vans required to deliver them, redeploy people – or reduce headcount – and the cash saved can immediately be used to pay for the service. The approach therefore becoming self-funding.
CCube Solutions has a proven ability to deliver based on two decades of expertise and an established track record of project success in the NHS. Today, its EDMS is used at 28 trusts and health boards around the country including Aintree, Addenbrooke’s, Aneurin Bevan, Milton Keynes, North Bristol, Papworth, St Helens and Sheffield Teaching Hospital.