Commissioning | ARMA

Happy 2018?

Happy New Year to all our supporters.

Although it is hard to feel that it will be happy for the NHS as winter crisis stories filled the media. Everyone in Government including the Prime Minister was forced to apologise as routine operations were postponed to help cope with the pressure of emergencies. Ministers appeared in the media to argue that the moves were part of a planned response and therefore there was no “crisis”. Listening to the coverage I took a small crumb of comfort: again and again, when giving an example of the negative impact of delays, hip and knee operations were mentioned.…

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Update to Ealing MSK JSNA chapter

The London Borough of Ealing and NHS Ealing CCG published their update to the Joint Strategic Needs Assessment (JSNA) chapter on Musculoskeletal Health in December 2017. The JSNA is a statutory document that describes the health and social care needs of the population, identifies gaps and unmet needs, and makes evidence-based recommendations to health and social care commissioners.

Two versions have been published. A visually appealing ‘Focus on’ Musculoskeletal Health chapter provides a compact, easy-to-navigate review, and is essential reading for commissioners and providers of musculoskeletal services:

http://www.ealingccg.nhs.uk/media/136195/EALING-JSNA-Focus-On-Musculoskeletal-Health-Dec17.pdf…

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Inflammatory Arthritis Toolkit

The British Society for Rheumatology has launched the Inflammatory Arthritis toolkit in partnership with the Royal College for GPs and health professionals. Designed to facilitate earlier treatment for this condition, this toolkit aims to be a user-friendly guide to inflammatory arthritis for primary care professionals, people affected by arthritis and clinical commissioning groups.

The RCPG have also provided a summary here.

South East Regional Musculoskeletal (MSK) one-day conference

NHS England and the Arthritis and Musculoskeletal Alliance (ARMA) are delighted to be hosting a South East Regional Musculoskeletal (MSK) one-day conference on Tuesday 28 November 2017 at the Arora Hotel, Crawley. The event is sponsored by NHS England and ARMA and is part of their joint MSK programme and will be organised by the Kent Surrey Sussex Academic Health Science Network.

The South East System MSK event will promote a coherent approach to transforming MSK services across the region by working directly with South East Sustainability Transformation Plans (STPs) footprints to support improvement in the quality of MSK care.…

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The BOA’s Four New Commissioning Guides

The British Orthopaedic Association (BOA) is pleased to announce the recent publication of four revised commissioning guides with the Royal College of Surgeons of England. These NICE-accredited guides set out best practice care pathways to assist CCGs in designing optimal care for their populations. We are extremely grateful to all those involved in the rigorous development and accreditation processes. The guides, which can be found here, are:

Pain Arising from the Hip in Adults
Painful Deformed Great Toe in Adults
Painful Osteoarthritis of the Knee
Treatment of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome

Following the recent BOA and ARMA position statements on the rationing of elective orthopaedic services, we are urging stakeholders to consider these guides and to promote their adoption wherever appropriate with local CCGs.…

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ARMA Policy Position: Prevention of Musculoskeletal Conditions

Arthritis and musculoskeletal conditions affect the bones, joints and muscles, and burdens the lives of so many people.

Musculoskeletal conditions are now the UK’s the biggest cause of pain and disability, accounting for an astounding one-in-five of all visits to the GP. Furthermore, trends indicate that more people than ever will be affected by MSK disorders in the coming years, which is why preventing them has never been more important. For this reason, the Arthritis and Musculoskeletal Alliance (ARMA), an alliance of prominent health charities, professional and research bodies, has produced a Policy Position Paper on Prevention of Musculoskeletal conditions.…

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ARMA Policy Position Paper on Joint Replacement Surgery

In early August, ARMA has published a Policy Position Paper titled:

‘Rationing’ Access to Joint Replacement Surgery and Impact on People with Arthritis and Musculoskeletal Conditions [document opens in pdf]

It deals with the damaging nature of thresholds and scoring tools, the problems of waiting times and restricted access to surgery, and how patients with musculoskeletal conditions are affected.

The Alliance is drawing attention to worrying trends in treatment access and the paper makes clear the key outcomes we are seeking from CCGs and the NHS.

Reaching new heights for the quality of care for people with musculoskeletal conditions

Guest blog by Liz Lingard, NHS RightCare Delivery Partner

Over the past 3 months I have joined the ‘Whole System MSK events’ that ARMA and NHS England have organised as the RightCare speaker. This was an opportunity to clarify the RightCare approach to everyone working across the system and how they can apply this in their local health economies. The core aim of RightCare aligns to what each of the ARMA partners aspires to achieve: ensure the right person is able to access the right care in the right place at the right time, making the best use of available resources to help deliver a sustainable NHS.

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Use of the Social Value Act by healthcare commissioners

New research conducted by National Voices and Social Enterprise UK has found that only 13% of Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) can clearly show that they are actively committed to pursuing social value in their procurement and commissioning decisions.

The Public Services (Social Value Act) 2012 requires commissioners to consider broader social, economic and environmental benefits to their area when making commissioning decisions. The Act was a response to the risk of competitive tendering focusing solely on cost at the expense of other forms of value.…

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New Resources to Improve Care Pathways

BRITISH SOCIETY FOR RHEUMATOLOGY AND ROYAL COLLEGE OF GENERAL PRACTITIONERS LAUNCH INITIATIVE TO IMPROVE CARE PATHWAYS FOR PEOPLE WITH INFLAMMATORY ARTHRITIS

In May 2017, BSR and the RCGP have launched a joint Quality Improvement project to improve care for people living with inflammatory arthritis. The joint project will deliver a suite of online resources to help improve pathways between primary and secondary care, with a focus on reducing delays to diagnosis and creating standardised, shared care agreements. The recent National Clinical Audit for rheumatoid and early inflammatory arthritis revealed delays in referral from primary care to specialist treatment for people with suspected inflammatory arthritis, with only 17% of cases being referred within the three days recommended by NICE.…

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