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How to present an accessible healthcare service in a tender

Accessible Healthcare

Accessibility in healthcare has been described as a ‘global challenge’. As a prominent challenge that many healthcare providers face, developing and maintaining an accessible service for patients is an ongoing issue across the healthcare industry.

Regularly, healthcare tenders have a question centred solely or partially around accessibility. Therefore, answering this question to demonstrate how your healthcare service is providing accessible healthcare for your patients is crucial.

This article will focus on what accessibility in healthcare is and why it is important, how it can be improved in practice and most importantly, how to answer an accessibility question on a tender.

What is accessibility in healthcare?

The definition of accessibility is given in the name itself; it is all about providing accessible healthcare for all.

Having accessible healthcare services available for those who need them is critical as it allows people to get the appropriate healthcare resources in order to help maintain or improve their health.

In a human rights context, accessibility is described by the World Health Organization as: ‘health facilities, goods and services must be within safe physical reach for all sections of the population, especially vulnerable or marginalized groups, such as ethnic minorities and indigenous populations, women, children, adolescents, older persons, persons with disabilities and persons with HIV/AIDS, including rural areas’.

Healthcare accessibility is a broad scope and relates to many different aspects.

Accessibility, therefore, may mean:

  • Access to buildings
  • Communications with healthcare staff
  • Management of appointments

There may be a variety of reasons as to why patients cannot access healthcare services. Some of the reasons may be:

  • Lack of transport links. Those living in an urban area may particularly struggle with transport
  • Health-related conditions. Certain health conditions may mean that an individual cannot travel to the property
  • Financial barriers. Primarily for transport or service charges (e.g. dental or eye tests)
  • Organisational barriers

Why is accessibility in healthcare important?

As mentioned above, accessibility in healthcare is key because an individual who is restricted from healthcare access can suffer from further or more serious health-related issues. Consequently, it could lead to serious complications such as disease, disability and even premature death.

Healthcare Accessibility Questions on a Tender

A healthcare tender will usually involve accessibility in one form or another. Before answering this question, think holistically about the healthcare service that you are currently providing to patients.

Asking questions such as “what are we doing to make our healthcare service more accessible for patients?” and “what do we plan to do to improve accessibility in the future?” will help direct your answer.

When writing your answer, you may want to focus on these specific elements:

1) Location and Transport

The location and transport links to your service will need to be carefully considered. Are you located in a central part of the city? Do you have transport links to your practice?

Presenting that you have bus routes, car parks or express buses available for your patients, all feeds into the accessibility of your healthcare service.

If you have free parking bays nearby, or even a ‘park and ride’ option, stating this within your answer will show that your service is accessible to patients.

2) Appointments

For healthcare to be accessible for all, there needs to be appointments available for those who need them. Offering on the day appointments is ideal for those who need urgently seen to.

Appointments available out of hours, for example, 6-8 pm, or weekend appointments, will be made accessible for those who can’t make the standard appointment times. Again, having these additional services enables ease of access for those who work full time or have other commitments that mean they can’t get to the standard appointment hours.

Making these appointments easily available, via online booking systems or through telephone lines, is also imperative. If patients are unable to get through to the line, this is an indication that this healthcare service isn’t readily accessible for them.

3) Equal Access

Considering equal access to healthcare services is a crucial implementation within your answer. This will also enable you to present that your service adheres to best practice and the Equality and Diversity (2010) policy.

For this answer, implementing your Equality and Diversity policy and providing details of the training provided to staff which relates to Equality and Diversity, will be beneficial when demonstrating best practice. We have an article centred around Equality and Diversity that has further information about this.

Equal access ensures that those who are part of a minority, are vulnerable, have protected characteristics or particularly ‘hard-to-reach’ groups are being treated fairly and non- discriminatory.

Providing details of any additional work that you do within the community to help those that are disadvantaged or within a minority will add value to this answer. This could include work undertaken with the homeless or the elderly.

Asylum Seekers or individuals that are limited in their ability to communicate also form part of this group. Having a translation organisation in partnership with your healthcare service will again, improve the accessibility for those groups.

4) Domiciliary Appointments

Although domiciliary appointments may not be stated within the contract, providing these appointments to those who cannot get to the service, will demonstrate that you are considering these groups and have additional measures in place for them. Reflecting this within your answer, will again, be highly beneficial.

5) Demonstrating your patient care service

Indicating that you aim to provide an excellent patient-centred service will be rewarded when answering this question.

Showing that you have various methods of feedback in place and that you actively strive towards improving feedback points, presents that you are trying to provide the best possible patient experience; this helps patient experience and accessibility.

If patients are experiencing any problems in terms of accessibility, asking them what their problems are will help you make the right steps to improving this. Feedback can be done in a variety of ways, our last article outlines some methods of feedback and how to improve patient experience overall.

 6) Accessible Information Standard

The Accessible Information Standard states that from 1st August 2016, organisations providing NHS care and/or publicly funded adult social care are legally required to follow this standard. Being aware of this standard and reflecting that your service aligns with best practice is essential.

NHS England stated that organisations should:

  • Ask people if they have any information or communication needs and find out how to meet their needs
  • Record those needs clearly and in a set way
  • Highlight or flag the person’s file or notes so it is clear that they have information or communication needs and how to meet those needs
  • Share information about people’s information and communication needs with other providers of NHS and adult social care when they have consent or permission to do so
  • Take steps to ensure that people receive information which they can access and understand and receive communication support if they need it
  • Contact and be contacted by, services in accessible ways. For example, via email or text messages, receive information and correspondence in formats they can read and understand, be supported by a communication professional at appointments if this is needed to support conversation.

Contact Our Team Today 

If you need help on a tender, contact our experienced team of writers today on 03301 1331 041.
Alternatively, send an email to info@klowconsulting.com for more information and details.

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How to develop a patient-centred service

The five-year forward view presented plans to work towards a more collaborative and informative relationship between patient and healthcare professional. A patient-centred service means that patients are getting the best experience, putting patients at the centre of their own health and healthcare.

In this article, we provide some tips on developing a patient-centred service.

What is patient-centred care?

To understand how to develop a patient-centred service, it is imperative to know what it consists of.

Patient-centred care, as stated by NHS England, “starts with the patient”. It revolves around the notion that the patient is in control of their health and the healthcare services that are provided for them.

Patient-centred care represents collaboration, power and pro-activeness, as the patient works alongside a healthcare professional in partnership to design and shape their own healthcare based on their needs and goals.

To form a greater understanding of patient-centred care, an effective patient-centred service mainly centres around the following ideas:

  • The person is treated with dignity, respect and compassion
  • Communicating and coordinating care between appointments and different services over time
  • Care is shared between a community health service and a hospital
  • Care is tailored to suit individual needs and what they want to achieve
  • Supporting individuals to help them understand and learn about their health
  • Finding ways to help them get better, look after themselves and stay independent
  • Being involved in their healthcare decisions

Benefits of a patient-centred service

Having a patient-centred service benefits the patient, practice and the healthcare professional greatly.

As such, there are many benefits to a patient-centred service, such as:

  • It improves patient outcomes by supporting patients with long-term conditions to manage their health and improve clinical outcomes. When individuals play a more collaborative role in managing their health and care, they are less likely to use hospital services, stick to their treatment plans and take medicine correctly.
  • Patients have the opportunity and support to make decisions about their care and treatment in partnership with health professionals are more satisfied with their care, are more likely to choose treatments based on their values and preferences rather than those of their clinician.
  • Individuals can gain more knowledge, skills and confidence in managing their health and healthcare. In turn, they are more likely to engage in positive health behaviours, which in turn, will create better health outcomes.
  • Person-centred care is good for healthcare professionals too- it increases staff performance and morale.

Putting staff at the heart of a patient-centred vision

NHS England and Public Health England provided a consultation document for the public named ‘Facing the Facts, Shaping the Future’. The workforce strategy is about placing staff at the “heart of a patient-centred vision”. To develop a patient-centred service therefore, staff members need to be actively involved in creating this vision.

NHS England has been drafting a workforce strategy to get staff members involved, by working pro-actively to create a patient-centred care service, one that will benefit them as much as the patient. As one of the many stated benefits of providing this service, staff morale and performance is a result of better patient experiences.

As healthcare professionals are the ones that can help create this vision, they must be aware of how to create a more positive patient experience.

Developing a patient-centred service

To develop a patient-centred service, you must effectively engage with patients, monitor their experience and improve their experience based on their feedback. Asking people if they are receiving the care that they need will give a good indication on that basis and make them feel more secure and cared for.

1) Patient involvement and experience

The first way to develop a patient-centred service is to put the patient at the heart of the service and improve their overall patient experience. A key part of patient-centred care is the patient being actively involved in their own healthcare.

Making patients central to their healthcare involves working collaboratively with people who use the service to support their development, skills and confidence. Patient-centred healthcare largely involves patients making informed decisions about their own health and healthcare.

There are many aspects which allow the patient to have a better experience. Based on Picker’s Eight Principles of Patient-centred Care there are eight main components: respect for patients’ preferences, co-ordination and integration of care, information and education, physical comfort, emotional support, the involvement of family and friends, continuity and transition and access to care. As a foundation for building a patient-centred service, following Picker’s basic principles as a guideline may assist in developing this service.

Part of caring for patients also involves caring for their families; this is otherwise known as family-centred care. If the patient has the support and involvement of their families within their healthcare, they are more likely to react positively.

It all starts with the patient; listening to their needs and designing patient experience based on these needs.

2) Monitoring services

Monitoring patient experience is the key to developing a patient-centred service.

There are some examples of ways to monitor and evaluate patient experience. Some examples are as followed:

  • Friend and family surveys
  • GP Patient Surveys
  • Focus Groups
  • PPG Group
  • Compliments Boxes
  • Patient Member Participation Groups

3) Evaluating data based on feedback

Evaluating data and using it to improve on a patient-centred service, will give you the opportunity to focus on the areas that need developing. Surveys and feedback methods will give you the opportunity to improve your service.

Understanding what is being asked of the patient and analysing this feedback will help you move towards this.

For example, GP patient surveys give a specific indication of what areas need improvement. An example of a GP patient survey is presented below:

As shown from the answers presented in this particular GP survey, patients are less satisfied with the appointment times available to them in comparison to how easy it is to get through to someone on the phone. All of these aspects form a greater patient experience.

Focusing and working on the areas that customers feel less satisfied with, will result in better patient experience and will form a more effective patient-centred service.

As seen from the table above, 34% of national NHS patients have not agreed on a plan with a healthcare professional to manage long-term conditions.

From the table below, a local GP practice shows that 83% of local patients did not have a conversation with a healthcare professional from their GP practice to discuss what is important to them when managing their condition(s).

 As part of a patient-centred service, patients with long-term health conditions should have an active role in their own healthcare. As seen from the chart above, this particular GP practice is scoring low on this, suggesting there were no discussions about managing their conditions and stating their healthcare goals. Thus, this would not particularly represent a patient-centred service.

Thoroughly understanding and analysing selected questions such as these, and developing based on what patients are feeding back, will give a basis for professionals to work with when building and developing a patient-centred service.

These issues can be improved by:

  • Having regular discussions about the patient’s healthcare
  • Discussing the patient’s long-term health conditions and their goals
  • Ask the patient questions such as ‘What’s important to you when it comes to your healthcare?’ ‘What would make things better for you?’
  • Allowing the patient to be involved in making important decisions about their health
  • Involving the patient’s family in their healthcare
  • Setting out a plan of the patients’ health care conditions and practical steps about how to help them

Contact Our Team Today 

If you need help on a tender, contact our experienced team of writers today on 03301 1331 041.
Alternatively, send an email to info@klowconsulting.com for more information and details.

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How do I write an equality and diversity answer on a tender?

Equality and Diversity

Have you ever wondered how to get maximum marks on an Equality & Diversity question on a tender? The answer is simple.

The key to an effective Equality & Diversity answer is to improve your approaches to Equality & Diversity within your workplace, offer as many Diversity initiatives that you can and build a stronger and more inclusive workforce.

As you may be aware, an Equality & Diversity question appears on a large number of tenders. Thus, it is critical for your organisation to be aware of the requirements and provide the best possible answer. Being awarded top marks on this question will increase your chances of winning a tender.

The Equality Act (2010)

To demonstrate to the commissioner that you have an in-depth knowledge on Equality & Diversity, your policies should align with The Equality Act (2010). This shows that your organisation exercises best practice.

The Equality Act (2010) protects individuals, acting as a standing point for a more diverse and equal society. Types of discrimination can be against the following:

  • Age
  • Gender Re-assignment
  • Being married or in a civil partnership
  • Being pregnant or on maternity leave
  • Disability
  • Race including colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin
  • Religion or belief
  • Sex
  • Sexual Orientation

The Act covers:

  • The Equal Pay Act 1970
  • The Sex Discrimination Act 1975
  • The Race Relations Act 1976
  • The Disability Discrimination Act 1995
  • The Employment Equality (religion or belief) regulations 2003
  • The Employment Equality (sexual orientation) regulations 2003
  • The Equality Act 2006, part 2
  • The Equality Act (sexual orientation) regulations 2007

In order to stand as a diverse and equal organisation, buyers must reflect and implement the policies and codes of conduct that the Equality Act (2010) represents, making their policies readily available for customers, clients and any other significant stakeholders.

The Impact of Equality & Diversity Within an Organisation

Equality & Diversity within an organisation can improve the quality of the work delivered, create a diverse and integrated workforce, build stronger communities and identify under-representation within society. The more that this is evidenced within your answer, the more effective the answer will become.

To build a stronger and more inclusive workforce, there are some recommendations for what can be done. Reflecting some of these incentives will enable you to build a more constructive answer:

  • Conduct research to evaluate those who are under-represented within local communities
  • Monitor diversity during the recruitment process
  • Advertise traditionally and present vacancies utilising diverse job-boards
  • Build relationships with diversity partners to network more candidates
  • Work towards obtaining accreditations for diversity such as the ‘Two Ticks Scheme’ and ‘Clear Assured’

Having these initiatives and incentives in place within your organisation will help you substantially when answering this question.

What to Expect from An Equality & Diversity Question

You may be required to submit an eligibility questionnaire as part of the process; part of this questionnaire may be based on your organisations Equality & Diversity policies. Your answers to these questions will be measured against statutory regulations.

If equality is a core principle within the tender, you may be asked to provide further information and evidence to support the submission. For an Equality & Diversity question, commissioners need to ensure the quality in the terms and conditions; employers must offer equal pay, terms & conditions promotion, transfer opportunities, training, dismissal and redundancy procedures to all employees regardless of any personal characteristics.

It is important to know what will be asked of you for an Equality & Diversity question. You may be asked to provide:

  • Your organisation’s Equality & Diversity policies
  • Details of any unlawful discrimination breaches
  • Any formal investigations carried out on your organisation in the last 3 years
  • Copies of recruitment training or promotion instructions

An example of Equality & Diversity questions:

  • Provide the processes your organisation has in place to ensure that candidates are managed in a fair and non-discriminatory manner
  • Provide the processes your organisation has in place to ensure that you attract a diverse and inclusive candidate base
  • Do you provide Equality and Diversity training for staff?
  • Has your organisation been the subject of any formal investigation by the commission for Racial Equality, The Equality Opportunities Communities or the Disability Rights Commission on grounds of alleged unlawful discrimination?

Preparing your Equality & Diversity Answer

You will need to take into consideration your organisation’s practices when it comes to Equality & Diversity. When providing details of your organisations Equality & Diversity policy, your answer will have added quality if you are able to understand, monitor and evaluate the local demographics that are contextually stated within the tender. Identifying and demonstrating your knowledge of under-represented communities and then proposing practical ways to engage with them with help you to prepare this answer.

You will also have to take into consideration when preparing your answer:

  • How to attract a more diverse workforce
  • How you ensure equal opportunities within your organisation
  • How to measure and evaluate the success of attracting and retaining a diverse workforce
  • How you ensure that staff are well equipped to meet the equitable approaches expected of your policy and procedures
  • How you advise clients on Equality & Diversity issues and impacted procedures
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How do I apply for NHS England’s Pseudo Dynamic Purchasing System (PDPS) framework for GP APMS contracts?

APMS Contract

What it is, how you bid for it and why you should consider it.

As you may have seen, NHS England have recently published a prior information notice which may change the way that GP’s contracts are commissioned. It may be vital for you to apply for this contract so that you can bid for local services in the future.

What is the Pseudo Dynamic Purchasing System (PDPS) contract?

NHS England have recently announced an upcoming contract opportunity.

NHS England and NHS Improvement have launched a new online procurement tool (Pseudo Dynamic Purchasing System, otherwise known as PDPS), which will include a list of pre-approved GP providers that can be invited by local commissioners to deliver local GP services. The PDPS system is planned to be live from January 2020. The estimated date of the contract notice is 01/12/2019.

There are three main marketing engagement events for this contract, which we strongly urge you to attend. These events will be centred around the new PDPS tool. The events are in Leeds (23/10/2019- pm), Birmingham (28/10/2019- pm) and London (30/10/2019- pm).

To book on to any of these events or find out more information about them you can follow this link: https://www.events.england.nhs.uk/national-dynamic-purchasing-system-events.

APMS services- information about lots

There are two main “lots” which are planned in the scope of the APMS service:

Lot 1. Routine GP Services

Supporting local commissioners, this lot will enable the delivery of procurement plans for replacing existing or securing additional GP services. It covers the list-based services expected from all GP practices in England. APMS contracts will fit the tailored needs of each local commissioner.

Lot 2. Caretaker Services

Lot 2 consists of urgent cover arrangements which are approved by primary care and commissioning committees on a case by case basis to ensure a safe and sustainable GP service continues for patients when a GP contract terminates suddenly and unexpectedly.

A new purchasing system for GP’s

The PDPS is being set up under the Light Touch Regime for Health Care contracts within the Public Contracts Regulations 2015. The system is being implemented by NELCSU (North and East London Commissioning Support Unit) on behalf of NHS England and NHS Improvement.

THE PDPS 4-year procurement exercise will oversee:

  • GP providers appointed to an electronically managed list of approved providers- GP providers can apply and be added to this list at any time during the 4-year period.
  • Approved GP providers invited via the e-platform to respond to request for APMS services from local commissioners. The “call-off” will be matched to the adapted needs of local commissioners.

So, should you apply for the PDPS contract?

NHS England and NHS Improvement, and Clinical Commissioning Groups will be encouraging all GP providers with an interest in providing routing and/or caretaker APMS services to apply to be on the PDPS.

Any GP can apply for this contract and interest can be from a local GP contract holder within a Primary Care Network or a larger GP contract holder and other healthcare providers such as caretakers.

Application to the approved provider list does not commit you to provide APMS services but does mean you will be able to bid when local needs arise. As such, it is worth considering this contract carefully as the decision not to bid may deny your chances of bidding for local services in the future.

The contract will allow you to apply at any time. Although, if a call-off happens you must already be on the framework to respond. Therefore, it is critical that you consider applying as soon as possible for this contract.

What you need to demonstrate to qualify as an approved provider

There is a set of criteria that providers need to meet to be accepted onto the PDPS contract. Minimum threshold on suitability and capability will need to be met and key pass/fail questions will be asked of providers in the following areas:

  • Financial and economic standing
  • Technical and professional ability
  • Mandatory and discretionary exclusion questions
  • Other subject matter questions

How to Apply For The NHS England PDPS Framework for GP APMS Contracts

K Low Consulting can help assist you in registering interest and applying for this contract.

You only need to apply once for this contract. Once we have secured your place on the framework it is assured that you are able to bid for any APMS contracts that NHS England ‘calls-off’ via the framework for the next 4 years.

To get more information about the contract or to raise your interest, contact K Low Consulting today at info@klowconsulting.com or call our office on 0330 133 1041.