Out-of-hours healthcare contract put out to tender

Jul 28 2007 by Caroline Innes, Liverpool Daily Post

THE contract for out-of-hours GP care for over one million Merseyside patients has been formally put out to tender.

Liverpool, Knowsley and Sefton Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) have revealed they have now invited interested healthcare providers to apply for the contract which, once awarded, will run for a minimum of three years providing GP cover for the region’s population.

The current contract for the provision of out-of-hours service, provided by Wavertree based Urgent Care 24 (UC24), ends on March 31, 2008, with the new contract commencing immediately.

Adverts placed by the three PCTs in the Health Service Journal and the British Medical Journal state that Sefton PCT is considering opting out of the commissioning consortia by offering its own contract and choosing a separate service provider.

Sources within Sefton PCT have suggested that this is because Sefton is “extremely reluctant” to recommission with UC24 following significant concerns about the service, which included fears over patient confidentiality after a bug was discovered in their offices, breaches in security after blank prescriptions were found in a reception areas and two cases which were referred to the GMC – one of which is still being investigated.

Last night, UC24 executives confirmed they were considering all options and would be tendering for all three contracts, alongside a number of other providers – including a consortia made up of a large number of Liverpool GPs.

UC24 chief executive Nigel Wylie said: “The PCTs have their own reasons for offering the range of contracts that they have, and as the existing service provider we will consider all three options.

“We are currently at the forefront of out-of-hours service providers nationally and are confident that any tender we put in will be viewed favourably.”

Mr Wylie added that speculation that their not-for-profit organisation was seeking strategic partners in order to submit a bid was unfounded, and talks between UC24 and the Mastercall service, based in Stockport, were simply to forge links as part of contingency plans should an emergency arise.

He added: “We have the responsibility for providing care for over one million patients.

“It is only right that we forge links as part of contingency plans with other similar-sized service providers.

“This was a strategic decision to ensure that if the power fails or, like last year, the call centre has to be evacuated, we have back-up.

“It is written in our articles of memorandum that we must not make a profit. Mastercall is a limited company. We could not join forces with them even if we wanted to.”

A spokesman for the three PCTs said: “Earlier this year Liverpool, Knowsley and Sefton PCTs reviewed their commissioning intentions for out-of-hours services and decided to re-tender this service against a revised contract specification.

“Interested providers have now been invited to submit expressions of interest to operate this service. All organisations that apply will be asked to provide information in a pre-qualification questionnaire, to assess their credentials.”

carolineinnes