Provision of Increasing access for Psychological therapy

Health Education England (HEE) wishes to commission a range of education to provide the Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) workforce in the Midlands region.
The education will be developed taking account of the strategic priorities identified in:
• Service Commissioners’ emerging service priorities.
• The NHS Long Term Plan.
• National guidance and emerging national and professional frameworks (Section 2).
• Service providers’ current and emerging priorities.

The education provider will take account of the development needs of the existing IAPT workforce as well as those of the future workforce.

For the purposes of this tender HEE has identified Psychological Wellbeing Practitioner training (the PWP Programme), described in Section 3 of this document, for which tenderers will have the opportunity to bid.

HEE-M wishes to ensure local accessibility and therefore the commissions will be offered across only the geographical area as described in Section 3 of this document.
Indicative commissioning numbers are set out in Section 3.

Exact numbers for each of the years will be identified following the annual workforce planning process.

Tenderers will need to demonstrate how they will meet any relevant national standards of education, for example, NHSE/I IAPT guidance and the British Psychological Society Standards for the accreditation of psychological wellbeing practitioner training programmes
Tenderers should evidence that they will be able to fulfil any other criteria outlined in this specification.

The successful tenderer(s) will be expected to discharge their obligations in relation to the portfolio of education in accordance with their responsibilities under the provisions of the Equality Act 2010 and all directives and regulations pertaining to the equalities agenda.

All costs accrued by the tenderer as a result of this specification are to be borne by the tenderer. This includes but is not limited to costs for responding to this specification, to subsequent negotiations and meetings and any legal advice taken by the tendered which relates to the tender.

There are several strategic documents which set out the factors which influence the future education and training for IAPT including:
• The NHS Long Term Plan – NHS England 2019
• The NHS Mental Health Implementation Plan 2019/20 – 2023/24 – NHS England 2019
• The Five Year Forward View for Mental Health
• The NHS Constitution and Values

The following areas are of particular relevance to this tender:
• Patient safety and ‘harm free care’.
• The importance of responding to the needs of local communities.
• The integration of services across health and social care, professional and organisational boundaries to ensure that patients’ needs are met.
• Safeguarding adults and children.
• Health care professionals as practitioners, partners, and leaders.
• The development of leadership capacity and capability.
• Tackling Inequality in Health Care.
• Public health, health promotion and Making Every Contact Count.
• Personalisation, personal health budgets and social prescribing.
• Client and carer involvement.
• Duty of candour.
• Extending services in the community and moving care closer to home.
• Developing innovative service delivery models.
• NHS Values which provide a common ground for cooperation to achieve shared aspirations at all levels of the NHS.
• Best practice evidence in value-based recruitment to better support patient care and experience.
• Parity of esteem between patients with mental health needs and those with physical health needs.

The following elements are central to this provision and tenderers will demonstrate how they will ensure that:

• There is effective partnership working and communication with healthcare providers particularly in relation to student recruitment, learning, progress, and assessment.
• They can demonstrate an understanding of the different issues and challenges encountered when working within a regional context.

The proposed programmes will:
• support the development of the IAPT workforce ensuring that the service continues to be delivered safely with high quality.
• develop and evolve iteratively as the strategic commissioning intentions of Service Commissioners, the needs of patients and requirements from service providers develop and evolve.
• be accessible to all appropriate health care organisations delivering psychological therapies within the geographical areas described in Section 3.
• address the issue of physical and mental health needs (including the needs of people living with learning disabilities) across health and social care recognising the essential contribution of public health, health promotion and ill-health prevention.
• be structured in such a way to encourage diversity and a workforce representative of the population served
• be underpinned by the principles of personalised care planning, co-production and enabling individuals to be in control of their own care.