Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust has published an open early engagement notice for the procurement of digital tech for the clinical management of lower back pain, seeking ideas and applications from providers under the Crown Commercial Service RM6200 Artificial Intelligence DPS.
With a closing date of 8 April 2024, the notice calls for a provider who can “enable the trust to deliver population health scale interventions” through utilisation of technology in this area. The notice highlights the need for treatment plans to be personalised and to allow patients to track progress, adapting in real-time to patient feedback and evaluation, and with interventions being delivered through video or live stream.
Providers must also be able to provide a complete pathway for eligible patients, covering triage, assessment, treatment, signposting, onward referral, and returns to traditional pathways where required. The notice also states that providers will be CQC registered and capable of taking responsibility for the ongoing management of the caseload, with “delivery overseen by clinical staff who can contact patients should they require non-digital intervention”.
Working with the trust, providers should “accept self or clinical referral within the guidance of predetermined referral criteria”, report back to the trust on clinical and patient-reported outcomes, and work with the trust to “codevelop risk stratification and algorithms and integrate into the wider MSK pathway to provide a seamless experience for patients”.
To read the early engagement in full, please click here.
In related news, NHS Wales Shared Services Partnership recently published a prior information notice for a digital therapy programme for Powys Teaching Health Board, worth an estimated £1,221,032, with the notice intended to help the Health Board learn what is possible and available in the market as it shapes strategy and requirements.
Elsewhere, NHS Supply Chain issued a £500 million contract notice for a Dynamic Purchasing System (DPS) Agreement to help bring MedTech products to market, focusing on offering a route to market for innovative products and enabling access to products and associated services that are “of an innovative nature” and “would not normally be available”.
