NHS Herefordshire and Worcestershire Clinical Commissing Groups Adult Autism Service

This is a Voluntary Ex Ante notice for the purpose of Transparency and is not a call for competition.

NHS Herefordshire and Worcestershire CCGs wish to publish their intent with regards to the following service - Autism Assessment, Diagnosis and Support Service for Adults.

This notice is to advise the market of the intent to award this contract to the current provider, The Family Psychologist, without a call for competition. Under the process the notice is advertised for a period of ten calendar days and discussions with the provider, if there are no challenges, will commence at the close of the standstill period at midnight Friday 14th February 2020. Any objections to this notice should be lodged with the Procurement lead @ …@nhs.net

The Family Psychologist provides a service for the population of Worcestershire that offers assessment, diagnosis and post-diagnostic support for adults who present with a suspected Autistic Spectrum Condition and a diagnosis service for the population of Herefordshire.

Service description

The elements of the service are described below;

a) Initial assessment or triage:

The Service Provider will be expected to carry out an initial triage to define the needs of the service user and together agree the outcomes required and approximate timescales of support.

b) Autism specific support:

A suitable combination of one to one or group support to provide short-term support to develop an individual support plan and strategies. It is expected that a service user and their family will be supported for no more than four sessions.

The support may be:

• Low level support: for adults who either do not go through a clinical diagnosis or need low level support prior to undergoing the clinical diagnosis. It is expected that a substantial number of service users will access this element of the service, some of whom will not need to progress to higher level support or to c) below or
• Higher level support: this is likely to be for adult's post-diagnosis, it is anticipated that a smaller number of service users will access this element of the service.

c) Diagnosis:

Generally, a diagnosis will be agreed if the service user demonstrates significant social disability in addition to the clinical presentation based on the conditions below;

• Significant risk of self-harm, harm to others, risk of harm from others, or serious self-neglect.

• Substantial disability caused by illness, such as inability to self-care, care for dependants, or sustains relationships.

• Recurring crises leading to frequent admissions/interventions.

• Significant risk of homelessness, imprisonment, loss of work or supportive relationships.

• Family support or designated support agency unable to cope with behaviours d) Working with other providers across pathways

Providing expert advice to health and social care providers on autism and their role in enabling access to support through appropriate reasonable adjustments. See attachment.