•  Convening stakeholders developed a shared purpose of improving  patient and population outcomes
•  Involvement of subject matter experts informed design and delivery
•  Increased service provider diversity - all nine local authorities now have consistent access to all seven service providers
•  Reduced waiting times and increased  patient treatment choice
•  A ‘healthy’ bed night price competition offering significant savings for lower-funded local authorities.

The Challenge

Since 2020, additional ring-fenced funding has been allocated to local authorities in England to specifically help them improve their in-patient (IPD) drug and alcohol detox treatment and recovery systems.
 
MIAA’s client, a sub-regional consortium made up of nine local authorities, commissioned MIAA to deliver a programme of work that would deliver the infrastructure required to implement and embed this new IPD patient pathway.

There were Memorandum of Operation (MoU) conditions associated with the grant funding:
  
•  The funding must be managed collectively through a Consortium arrangement where all nine local authorities are active members

•  The funding must be used to commission service providers through ‘block contract’ arrangements

Traditionally, individual local authority in-patient detox pathways have been restricted to singular IPD service provider set-ups, however the grant funding offered an opportunity to increase the number of in-patient detox facilities that local authorities had access to.

The Outcomes

A new, grant funded patient pathway now runs alongside existing in-patient detox pathways, and provides access for service users to seven additional service provider facilities – who offer a range of treatment options and settings.

In addition, MIAA have delivered new pathway components to ensure that the end-to-end service is fully compliant with the governing MoU conditions alongside meeting the needs of the lead local authority commissioner’s back office internal governance requirements. The resulting pathway has delivered great benefits for the commissioners and their service users, including:

Seven new service providers commissioned through block contract arrangements via a single procurement approach, with the collective buying power of the Consortium creating a ‘healthy’ bed night price competition among IPD service providers – offering variety and significant savings for lower-funded local authorities.

Non-sensitive activity data is collected and analysed which tracks pipeline and treatment activity, expenditure and capacity in real time and has proven to be a very valuable monitoring tool for the consortium. The granular insights it provides are new and not available within existing local authority domains, and can track performance against pathway KPIs alongside identifying areas for improvement and development. 

Increased service provider diversity - by commissioning service providers collectively and more freely than through individual local authority procurement processes, all nine local authorities now have consistent access to all service providers commissioned through the consortium.

Wider health system benefits have included a reduction in several areas, such as reductions in frequent presenter attendance in acute facilities, deaths whilst in treatment and calls to / support requirements from community providers.