CSU wins multi-million data deal

NHS Arden and Greater East Midlands Commissioning Support Unit has agreed a multi million pound deal to provide data management services for a group of 24 clinical commissioning groups in the North West of England.

The contract, worth £2 million per year, will see the CSU handle the region’s responsibilities as part of the data service for commissioners programme. This was established by NHS England to make sure that local commissioning decisions are based on “robust, standardised data that has been processed efficiently and is accessed legally.”

As part of the programme there are ten regional offices that provide data modelling services to enable CCGs, local authority public health teams and specialised commissioners to plan and commission local healthcare services.

These regional offices act as an intermediary service to process, analyse and package patient information into a format that can be legally used by commissioners.

NHS Arden and Greater East Midlands CSU will now operate the North West regional office, covering 24 CCGs across Cheshire, Greater Manchester and Merseyside.

As well as supporting CCG commissioning, the CSU will use data management to support Public Health England and other providers working in the local health economy, which is undergoing major upheaval following an agreement to give Greater Manchester control of an integrated £6 billion NHS and social care budget. 

NHS Arden and Greater East Midlands was chosen to deliver the service following a tender process in which it beat several CSUs and organisations that are part of ‘lot one’ of NHS England’s commissioning support Lead Provider Framework, which contains organisations approved to provide end to end commissioning support. 

NHS North West CSU, the current provider of data service for commissioners activities in the region, was unsuccessful in its bid earlier this year to be in lot one of the framework and therefore could not bid for the contract. Around 25 staff from NHS North West CSU will move employer as a result of the transition in service.

John Parkes, managing director, NHS Arden and Greater East Midlands CSU, said: “We are delighted to have secured this opportunity to deliver data services to North West CCGs. We have extensive experience of providing data management and analytics across different regions and diverse populations.”