Brochure which accompanies NHS Midlands and East's AQP

Introduction
NHS Midlands and East is an ambitious organisation and is committed to improving
the quality and safety of NHS services. It wants patients to be able to quickly and
conveniently access the highest quality services, and it wants to support GPs and
Clinical Commissioning Groups in working with the best placed providers.
NHS Midlands and East has set out five
‘Ambitions’ for the coming year; a key one being
to deliver a ‘Patient Revolution’ in customer
service and experience. The ‘Patient Revolution’
seeks to place patients in the centre of their care,
and a key part of this ambition is to promote
greater choice and customer focus.
As part of the Government’s commitment to
driving up quality and improving care for patients,
it has introduced the principle of ‘Any Qualified
Provider’ (AQP), giving patients choice over where
they receive certain community services. Some
of the providers will be from within the NHS,
while others may be from the independent and
voluntary sectors.
Based on the Government’s discussions with
national patient groups, eight services were
initially prioritised for potentially extending choice
of AQP in 2012. Following this, each Primary
Care Trust Cluster engaged with patients and
other stakeholders to prioritise three or more
community or mental health services in which
choice could be extended for its own patient
population.
NHS Midlands and East supports the extension
of patient choice as a way of empowering
patients and improving outcomes and delivering
on our ambition to create a ‘Patient Revolution’.
Experience shows that the introduction of
new providers, from both the NHS and the
independent and voluntary sectors, can bring
new ideas which enable service innovation and
drive up overall standards of care. Providers who
demonstrate high levels of quality, responsiveness
and patient satisfaction will be able to attract
more patients.
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As part of the AQP programme, NHS Midlands
and East has encouraged consistency of service
specification across the region and use of the
national qualification process, to reduce
procurement transaction costs and develop
economies of scale across potential markets.
This brochure gives an overview of the AQP
programme in the Midlands and East region for
2012. It lists the potential opportunities for
providers by commissioning organisation and gives
their contact details. We want to attract only the
best providers to this region and this document
aims to help them respond to this opportunity.
Dr Stephen Dunn
Director of Policy & Strategy
March 2012