Accountable Care Organisations

(asked on 28th November 2016) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what his policy is on the introduction of accountable care organisations.


Answered by
 Portrait
David Mowat
This question was answered on 1st December 2016

Local service leaders in every part of England have worked together to produce shared Sustainability and Transformation Plans (STPs) to transform health and care in the communities they serve, and to agree how to spend increasing investment in the National Health Service. Some of the 44 STPs feature plans to develop accountable care organisations, the characteristics of which will depend on local service design.

Through the new care models programme, the Five Year Forward View arms-length bodies are helping local partnerships develop and implement new care models, two of which are population-health models - Multispecialty Community Providers (MCPs) and Integrated Primary and Acute Care Systems (PACS). As these care models develop, the partner organisations are expected to take on shared accountability for the health and care of the populations they serve.

By sharing accountability, and providing services that best meet the needs of their local populations, MCPs and PACS are expected to deliver much greater integration between primary and acute care; physical and mental health; health and social care; improving health outcomes; and the quality, accessibility, and efficiency of local services. Where this involves substantial service reconfiguration, local areas will be expected to consult patients and the public in the normal way.

The new care models programme has recently published the MCP and PACS frameworks, which set out further the emerging care models and their benefits, and examples of best practice that others can implement. National MCP and PACS contracts are being developed to underpin these care models. Existing requirements on the NHS around commissioning and the procurement of services, including services provided by the independent sector, will continue to apply to new care models.

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