NHS Institute
the programme is developing its' partnership with the NHS Institute, with a particular focus on the development of the mental health elements of the Opportunity Locator tool for commissioners.
Promoting wellbeing and public mental health
The Mental Health Commissioning Programme is working with the NMHDU Wellbeing and Public Mental Health programme to produce practical guidance for PCTs and Local Authority Commissioners that will support them in making local decisions about mental health improvement and the development and provision of local mental health promotion and prevention services and interventions. This guidance will aim to form one part of a suite of World Class Commissioning Guidance that aims to help embed health and wellbeing implementation into the NHS system with support from partner agencies.
The aim of the guidance is to provide a practical resource for PCTs and Local Authorities to enable them to commission preventive and health promoting interventions for population mental health and wellbeing. The guidance will enable the NHS and its partners to take forward actions called for in the NHS Next Stage Review on promotion and prevention in mental health over the initial period of 2009-2011. The work is based on the essential competencies for commissioning and uses a public health approach, which identifies the social determinants and root causes of poor mental health, mental illness and inequalities and provides cost-effective and evidence based interventions to promote, sustain and improve mental health and well-being. The guide will provide a summary of the key policy messages, the supporting evidence and will use the essential principles and processes for good quality commissioning.
Project Lead: Gregor Henderson
Read the National Guidance on Commissioning for Wellbeing and Public Mental Health.
Best practice guide for service user involvement in commissioning
This guide is being co-produced with the NW SHA it will set out international best practice including the development of peer specialists. Discussions have been held with potential service user led organisations with a view to a contract being let to develop the guide. This work is at an early stage of development. The guide will be a practical tool for MH Commissioners
Partnership with the Industry and Mental Health Services Collaborative (IMHSeC)
The IMHSeC partnership are supporting a piece of work around outcomes. This support will aid the development of a range of practical options to support effective commissioning of mental health services. A project team has been convened who will be responsible for the development and implementation of a detailed project plan and the IMHSeC group are working closely with the NW SHA on this product.
Mental Health Minimum Data Set
Improving current, and scoping future data requirements
The work is developed and delivered primarily through a strategic partnership with The Information Centre for Health & Social Care and East of England SHA via a stakeholder delivery group. This work will develop over three phases:
(a) a comprehensive baseline of the data currently available to commissioners
(b) identification with commissioners of their future data requirements to support the transformation of Mental Health commissioning
(c) a development phase to establish the new data requirements.
The first phase of this process is now complete with the publication and analysis for the first time of the Mental Health Minimum Data Set in full and by PCT. The data that has been published establishes a baseline from which commissioners' future data requirements may be developed.
Project Lead: Netta Hollings
www.mhmdsonline.ic.nhs.uk
Mental Health Joint Strategic needs Assessment Tool-Kit
Joint Strategic Needs Assessment and Mental Health Commissioning Toolkit - A practical guide, 2009
This practical toolkit aims to support mental health commissioners comprehensively assess levels of need in their local community.
This work is now at an advanced stage and has been steered by a stakeholder delivery group established for this purpose. A final round of consultation on this product is now underway. As with all the emerging products of the programme the active support and endorsement of colleagues in World Class Commissioning is essential to future successful uptake across the NHS and Local Government sector. This work has been led by Luke Ward from the Government Office in East of England in partnership with East of England SHA and national colleagues.
Project Lead: Luke Ward
Clinical and Professional Engagement - A guide for mental health professionals
A joint project between the Mental Health Commissioning Programme and Commissioning Support for London Development Centre, the aim of the ‘Mental Health World Class Commissioning - A guide for mental health professionals' is to provide a practical introduction to World Class Commissioning for professionals and clinicians, and to demonstrate first, the importance of their active involvement in the commissioning process, and second, how, when and where they can usefully contribute to the commissioning process.
Written by a group of policy experts and clinical leaders, the guide arises from the need to ensure that commissioning decisions are based on good evidence and professional expertise and knowledge of the needs of local communities.
Building on practice-based commissioning, the personalisation agenda and the imperative for mental health commissioning to address both health and social care needs, this guide embodies Lord Darzi's vision for World Class Commissioning: to be ‘the key vehicle for delivering a world-leading NHS equipped to tackle the challenges of the 21st century'. In particular it references his central principle that ‘increased clinical and patient input, combined with a more accurate assessment of long-term local requirements, will ensure services are more closely designed to meet evolving patient needs'.
- World Class Commissioning: A Guide for Professionals
Click here to download the document
The Commissioners Friend
Mental health remains a clinical priority for government and as a result the last decade has seen significant changes. Mental health services have been transformed over the last decade, largely through the implementation on the National Service Framework for Mental Health alongside a range of supporting guidance. The focus has tended to be on the development and implementation of a prescribed set of services rather than the commissioning of those services. It has been recognised that commissioning of mental health services has not been as strong as other clinical areas. There may be a number of reasons for this, including lack of capacity and capability within PCTs.
The Mental Health Commissioners Friend (MHCF) was first published in 2005 as part of a range of guidance documents produced by the National Primary and Care Trust Development Programme (NatPaCT). It was intended to assist PCTs and Local Authorities (LAs) to develop their skills, expertise and knowledge in relation to commissioning mental health services. Since its' publication there have been a number of legislative, policy, guidance and organisational changes. Many of these have been within the NHS, although some have also been in the LA environment. In many cases these changes have overlapped both health and social care.
The nature of the environment in which commissioners operate remains as dynamic as ever. It is sometimes challenging for senior managers to absorb the wealth of information and guidance that is published. Its complexity makes it increasingly challenging to digest that information and ensure that it permeates through the management structure and becomes embedded in the thinking and practice of the broader staff community. In this context the MHCP, in partnership with the London Development Centre, has commissioned an update of the MHCF document. The original guidance will be reviewed in the context of the range of changes that have taken place since its publication. The result of that process will be the publication of an amended and updated version that is accessible, digestible and relevant for today's commissioning environment. It is expected that the document will be disseminated to PCTs and LA's across England as part of the broader programme to improve quality and effectiveness in mental health commissioning led by NHMDU.