Full coverage: Commissioning board sets priorities and rules for 2013-14

18 December, 2012 | By Dave West

The NHS Commissioning Board today publishes its planning guidance for 2013-14.

The guidance, called Everyone Counts: Planning for Patients 2013/14, is the first published by the commissioning board, under the reformed NHS system.

It plays a similar role to the NHS Operating Framework, setting priorities and targets, and financial and planning rules.

Sir David Nicholson says in the document: “Focusing on outcomes to plan NHS services represents a significant opportunity to build on our achievements to date… At the same time, we must not fall into the trap of thinking that because we have improved access that the job is done - the rights and pledges in the NHS Constitution must be delivered for everyone who uses the services we commission.”

HSJ’s analysis includes:

Read the full document

Readers' comments (11)

nusrat latif | 18-Dec-2012 9:41 am
Very thorough and interesting
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Anonymous | 18-Dec-2012 10:34 am
I wish the DH would produce these important documents with ordinary titles rather than the vomit inducing ones that seem so prevalent these days - Everyone counts, planning for patients. Honestly, I ask you, so we've never thought or done that before? Ridiculous.
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Anonymous | 18-Dec-2012 3:20 pm
^^^ Anon 10.34am: whilst you make a fair point, unfortunately despite successive culls in primary care, there is still a breed of manager prevalent that couldn't give a damn about patients - and that's what makes me sick.

A timely reminder of why we're in the health service can't hurt.
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Anonymous | 18-Dec-2012 10:43 pm
I think Nicholson should step aside and let someone with vision, and leadership skills take over..... all this talk, without a clear long term strategic view is sickening.
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Ian Gillespie | 18-Dec-2012 10:46 pm
Am I missing the 'continuous improvement' element in this? Where are we committing to improve RTT times for patients? We can't say we're happy with over 1/3 of a year waits for treatment?
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Anonymous | 19-Dec-2012 8:26 am
Setting aside its intentions - be they in good faith or not - what is truly offensive about this documentation pack is the glaringly obvious fact that its hyperbole must have taken external agency(ies) a while to produce. It may as well have been written by Saatchi et al, with its videos, glyphs, and revoltingly overworked wording that masks any genuine messages that may be buried therein. I am glad the NHSCB has the wherewithall to throw at this, and I am sure the irony of throwing said wherewithall at a documentation suite that sets out yet another year of crippling misery at the sharp (yes PATIENT!) end isn't lost on anyone.
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harry.longman@patient-access.org.uk | 19-Dec-2012 9:06 am
Annex A is measures, some of them quite interesting. For example, under 75 mortality. Will this help to reduce healthcare inequalities? Will this be used to move funding from affluent to deprived areas where life expectancy is lower? Or will it be used to give bonuses to those with greatest life expectancy, stoking the inverse care law?

Annex B is old fashioned targets, with the new name "rights and pledges". An arbitrary percentage for hitting an arbitrary number. Why 4 hours? Why 95%? I've written on the perverse effects of this target with comprehensive evidence.
http://www.patient-access.org.uk/userfiles/file/A&E%20-%20is%20there%20a%20better%20way%20HL%20v3.pdf
Who and why is driving this senseless policy? Lansley tried to ditch it. What happened?
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sjburnell@focused-on.com | 19-Dec-2012 1:06 pm
Whilst top-down imposed Targets are often less effective and often have more unintended consequences than well informed & more consensual key performance indicators, I would suggest that they have at least initiated some service improvement.
Was a typical Patient's experience of A&E or Wait for Treatment better before the introduction of such Targets?
On the other hand, if some Targets are considered 'poor' or 'inappropriate' or even 'statistically unsound' or easily 'gamed' then surely it is up to the Professionals & their Colleges to offer to meet better & more appropriate Service Levels that will give the Patient better experiences with better outcomes that Commissioners would be delighted to see & support?
Please, tell us the Public, what you really ought to be giving us if it is not what the DH are telling you that we want.
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KEVIN PRITCHARD | 21-Dec-2012 0:20 am
Thanks HSJ for highlighting this - I would likely have missed it otherwise.

Perhaps a gentle hint to DH communications dept would be useful - Christmas week maybe not best time to be sending so much important information out!

Merry Christmas all - wherever you are...

KP
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Anonymous | 22-Dec-2012 4:05 pm
The DH have been publishing the Operating Framework and/ or Planning and Priorities Guidance/ whatever name plus all the PbR road testing stuff and all the key planning documents for the last 5 years by my count at the same time each year, i.e. a week or so before Xmas.
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Anonymous | 8-Jan-2013 11:09 am
Once again an expensive, glossy production that might look fabulous on paper but is impossible to read on screen because it is laid out in columns!
Scrool down ..scroll up ... scroll down scroll u.... forget it i'll spend £5 of NHS money to print it.
This is the digital age (Digital First CQUIN) when will we have documents designed to be read on screen instead of .pdfs of print layouts?
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