The NHS in England is developing a ground-breaking new methodology for assessing ‘value’ that will put patient experience and outcomes, and an assessment of whole system costs, at the heart of procurement decisions, for the first time, rather than just item price.
The new methodology is being shared with NHS procurers and suppliers to help quantify the extent to which one product would compare to others in terms of patient health outcomes, removal of steps from the patient pathway, such as recurrence of infections requiring treatment, and hidden costs such as laundry. In future, price will account for no more than 40% of the assessment score.
The MedTech Directorate of the Department for Health and Social Care has led on the project which will soon see the methodology being applied to procurement processes for medical products and devices, and is expected to be rolled out across the NHS in England, with a view to it being made formal guidance in the autumn of this year, and embedded in NHS purchasing contracts as mandated for use by autumn 2025.
The campaign for change was led by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, a former health minister under Tony Blair, and now Patron of the Health Care Supplies Association, who lobbied NHS Procurement Minister Lord Markham at a meeting earlier this year, also attended by Director of Medtech Policy and Procurement at Whitehouse Communications, Chris Whitehouse.
They presented the evidence of a recent case study piloted by global hygiene company Essity in partnership with the NHS, where patients upgraded from cheap continence products to a higher value item. The study resulted in an overall cost reduction due to reduced laundry and staffing expenses among other factors, illustrating the importance of long-term thinking in procurement. The results of the study indicate that the NHS could save half a billion pounds by implementing a best value procurement framework for the purchase of continence products alone.
Lord Hunt, former Labour Health Minister commented: “Who would have thought that the humble absorbent continence pad could have such an impact, so quickly, on something as important as NHS procurement policy and practice – but it shows what can be delivered when a campaign for change is built upon irrefutable evidence that a change will be a win-win for patients, for carers and for NHS and social care providers alike, particularly when it is taken forward in a constructive, cross-party campaign.”
For Essity, Richard Maddison, said: “This is a groundbreaking approach and we’re delighted that our case study about the benefit to patients and reductions in hidden costs such as laundry, carers’ time, and relapses, provided some of the initial evidence that cheapest is neither best for patients nor best for NHS whole system costs.”
Chris Whitehouse, Director of Medtech Policy & Procurement at Whitehouse Communications, said: ‘This is a real paradigm shift in NHS procurement, and I am convinced that it will prove to be a major long-term boon for the finances of NHS England. We have significant evidence that impact upon patient quality of life and outcomes, and overall system costs are not properly taken into account when simply chasing the lowest price. I welcome this new approach, and look forward to it being fully embedded into NHS contracts in 2025.”
