Health Commissioning Programme
The programme’s key objective is to support new clinical commissioning groups to develop constructive and productive partnerships with voluntary and community organisations, and social enterprises.
Our health programmes focus on the value that a partnership approach can bring to the developing health systems.
Our current health programme is Building Health Partnerships, funded by the NHS Commissioning Board and delivered in partnership with NAVCA and IVAR.
In 2012 SEUK delivered a pilot Health Commissioning Improvement Programme in partnership with the Institution for Voluntary Action Research (IVAR) and funded by the Department of Health. Find out more about our health programmes below.
- Building Health Partnerships programme
- Pilot: Health Commissioning Improvement programme
- Resources
- Background to the health programmes
Background to our Health Programmes
The Health and Social Care Bill represents the biggest change in health care delivery since the inauguration of the NHS. There are major changes both nationally and locally to how services will be delivered and commissioned. One central alteration is the transference of commissioning to clinicians at a more local level.
The VCSE sector has a significant role to play in the delivery of health and social care, in assessing need, reaching out to vulnerable sectors of the community, as well as delivering services. Just over a quarter of voluntary sector organisations and a third of all social enterprises are involved in the provision of adult health and/or social care. This accounts for more than £4 billion worth of public sector funding.
Yet there are fears from the VCSE sector that much of the progress that has been made in the last ten years when it comes to their role in delivering health will be overlooked in the restructures; that trusted relationships and progress made in building understanding of the breadth of services that contribute to improving health and well-being will be lost.
Our programmes aim to ensure that this is not the case, and seek to work with the changing environment and the new evolving structures to make certain that the value and role of the VCSE sector is fully understood and able to fully participate in the health and social care economy.
Building Health Partnerships Programme (2013)
The Building Health Partnerships Programme is supported by the NHS Commissioning Board and delivered jointly with NAVCA (National Association of Voluntary and Community Action), SEUK and IVAR, it leads on from the successful pilot Health Commissioning Improvement Programme delivered by SEUK and IVAR.
This new programme is working in 12 regions: Bristol; Croydon; City & Hackney; Dudley; Durham Dales, Easington and Sedgefield; North Hampshire; Bradford & Airedale; Manchester; Shropshire; Staffordshire; Swindon; and Wakefield. It offers an opportunity to develop a learning programme designed to maximise the potential of collaboration between CCGs and local voluntary and community and social enterprise (VCSE) organisations to improve health in local communities.
The key objectives of the programme are:
- Assist CCGs to realise their aspirations for truly meaningful engagement with patients, carers and their communities;
- Enable the building of trust and mutual understanding between voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) organisations and CCGs;
- Enable senior staff in CCGs and VCSE to take key leadership roles in responding to the challenges of transforming health commissioning and delivery of improved health outcomes through cross-sector collaboration;
- Develop and implement local programmes of intervention for more effective engagement of the VCSE sector in health commissioning and delivery of improved health outcomes; and
- Facilitate the sharing of innovative models of effective working and successful approaches to clinical commissioning thus enabling the spread of best practice.
Initial diagnostic sessions have begun to take place in each of the regions. We will be sharing further learning here as the programme develops.
Health Commissioning Improvement Programme (pilot 2012)
The pilot Health Commissioning Improvement Programme was delivered in 2012 in partnership between SEUK and IVAR
We worked in four regions: Cornwall, South Cheshire, St Helens and Central Bedfordshire, with the Clinical Commissioning Groups, Health and Wellbeing Board, and VCSE sector, assessing the local challenges and opportunities and providing support across the sectors to develop understanding, systems and partnerships that work and support effective local health commissioning.
For more information do read our detailed report about the pilot or view a brief summary of the outcomes from the pilot programme here.
The Power of Partnerships
The Health Commissioning Improvement Programme demonstrated the importance of partnership work, for an area’s ability to develop effective health care in the emerging health environment. This resource uses the learning from the pilot and real experiences to offer practical tools and support to CCGs, HWBs and VCSE organisations to develop effective partnerships to deliver better health care. Its aim is to help people working in health think differently, more creatively and more practically than ever before, about the opportunities they have to meet changing health needs in difficult economic times.
For further information about the health programmes please contact Nancy Towers nancy.towers@socialenterprise.org.uk