Mind the gap: how will clinical commissioning groups work with specialists?

^{Helen Parker, Practice Partners, on the factors behind the development of the Vitality Partnership, a growing GP partnership in inner-city Birmingham}

With integration a central theme of the Government’s Health and Social Care Bill, and clinical commissioning groups required to include at least one specialist doctor, what are the options for managing the boundaries between primary and specialist care and between commissioning and providing?

‘Buying’ services from integrated providers may be one option. ‘Making’ specialist services within primary care – through GPs with special interests or consultant outreach clinics – may be another. However, both approaches are challenging the status quo, creating challenges for clinical commissioning groups and establishing new relationships between generalists and specialists.

This seminar described ways in which GPs are working with specialists to develop innovative services in community settings. It explored:

• How clinical commissioning groups can support these initiatives;
• How they might address conflicts of interest;
• The potential influence of clinical networks and senates;
• How patient care might be affected by these initiatives.

Speakers at the seminar included Dr James Morrow, a GP at Sawston Medical Practice in Cambridge, on how commissioning can support new relationships between GPs and specialists for the vertical integration of diabetic care. Ms Helen Parker, Director of Practice Partners, and Dr Naresh Rati, Executive Partner at Vitality Partnership, Birmingham, also presented on developing and commissioning specialist clinics in community settings.

This was the fourth in a series of seminars aiming to support the strategic development of clinical commissioning groups. The meetings provided an opportunity to explore the challenges facing clinical commissioners and to examine options for addressing these in ways that shape the underlying values of commissioning groups and help assure their success.

Other events in this series

For further details about the other events from this series, follow the links below to visit the dedicated event pages:

• Public health and GP commissioning, 5 April 2011
• Engaging with patients and the public: reviewing options and learning from the past, 4 May 2011
• Unleashing the potential of primary care: lessons from New Zealand’s experience of organised general practice, 23 June 2011
• Clinicians as commissioners and providers – can they really manage the conflicts of interest?, 8 February 2012