National Neonatal Audit Programme

Overview

The contract will initially be delivered for NHS-funded care in England, Wales, Scotland and the Isle of Man for a period of 3 years, at a maximum total budget of up to £1,233,000 GBP including VAT, £1,027,500 GBP excluding VAT. Bids exceeding this limit will be rejected. There is potential to extend the contract for up to two additional years. All pricing submissions must be in regard to this 'core' value, and not inclusive of any extension costs or aspirational intent costs, i.e. Please only submit a cost schedule up to the maximum core value of £1,233,000 GBP including VAT, £1,027,500 GBP excluding VAT. The maximum budget ‘core’ value is £1,233,000 GBP including VAT, £1,027,500 GBP excluding VAT excludes the potential two year extension and aspirational intent as described in section 14 of Annex A - Service Specification. Please note, there is no commitment by the Authority at this stage to include any aspirational intent measures. Taking the total of this aspirational intent into account, as well as the possibility that a contract extension may be offered for an additional two years, the potential ceiling value is £8,069,908 GBP including VAT. The role of a national clinical audit is to stimulate healthcare quality improvement through the provision of high-quality information on the organisation, delivery and outcomes of healthcare, together with tools and support to enable healthcare providers and other audiences to make best use of this information. Outcomes are benchmarked against available national guidance and standards e.g. quality standards from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), and those from other established professional and patient sources. Successful national audits are those where the individuals who are engaging with and using the audit results are also in a position to improve the system, and where there is a shared understanding of what good care looks like. National clinical audits are expected to: a.Develop a robust, high-quality audit designed around key quality metrics likely to best support local and national healthcare quality improvement b.Detect, describe and help reduce unwarranted clinical variation by systematically benchmarking performance, identifying outliers, and supporting services to understand variation in outcomes, processes and experience c.Achieve, articulate and maintain close alignment with relevant NICE national guidance and quality standards throughout the audit, as appropriate d.Enable healthcare quality improvement through the provision of timely, high-quality data that compares providers of healthcare, and comprises an integrated mixture of named Trust or Health board, Integrated Care System (ICS), commissioner, multidisciplinary team (MDT), possibly consultant or clinical team level and other levels of reporting e.Engage patients, carers and the public in a meaningful way, achieving a strong patient voice which informs and contributes to the design, functioning, outputs and direction of the audit f.Consider the value and feasibility of linking data at an individual patient level to other relevant national datasets either from the outset or in the future, and plan for these linkages from the inception of the contract g.Ensure robust methodological and statistical input at all stages of the audit h.Identify from the outset the full range of audiences for the reports and other audit outputs, and plan and tailor them accordingly i.Provide audit results in a timely, accessible and meaningful manner to support healthcare quality improvement, minimising the reporting delay and providing continual access to each unit for their own data j.Utilise strong and effective project and programme management to deliver audit outputs on time and within budget k.Develop and maintain strong engagement with local clinicians, networks, commissioners, patients and their families and carers and charity and community support groups in order to drive improvements in services Th