Web alert: resources to support commissioning--part 2.

In Part 1 of this two-part article on web resources to support commissioning I wrote about the radical, ongoing changes to the NHS brought about by the Government’s White Paper, Equity and Excellence: liberating the NHS. Since then, a number of consultations on different aspects of the paper have been published and the new Health and Social Care Bill has been presented to Parliament. The Bill is currently undergoing scrutiny by a public committee, to which anyone can submit evidence until 31 March 2011. The Liberating the NHS page on the Department of Health (DoH) website (www.dh.gov.uk/en/healthcare/ liberatingthenhs) remains a good source of information on progress with the transformation. Visitors to the site can download the various consultations, including An information revolution, which made the case that information is a health and care service in its own right, and asked how information should be collected, analysed and shared. The focus here is firmly on data, rather than other forms of information, such as research evidence and best practice, and it is to be hoped that the Government will advocate giving equal weight to all aspects of informationwhen decisions are being made about service improvement. The DoH has also launched a supplementary website, called Modernisation of health and care (healthandcare.dh.gov.uk), which includes news bulletins, regular commentary from GP commissioners and DoH executives and videos from interviews and conference presentations. Although the site is a little difficult to navigate, it is worth seeking out the sections on commissioning, and on the Pathfinder Learning Network (these can both be found under the ‘Context’ tab). ‘Pathfinder consortia’ are the groups of GPs that are taking the lead in developing the GP consortium model and identifying best practice that can then be more widely rolled out. Case studies written by these consortia are available on the site, along with an interactivemap showing where in the country these groups can be found (healthandcare.dh.gov.uk/gp-consortiamap). At the time of writing there are 141 pathfinder consortia covering around 50% of the population of England. The previous KnowledgeShare Web Alert looked at websites enabling GP commissioners to network with one another, and to stay up to date with the changing national picture. I also discussed the need for GP commissioners to draw on the work of national bodies, such as the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), and local information experts, such as NHS library and knowledge services, to ensure that best practice from elsewhere is incorporated into commissioning plans. In this issue we will consider a number of websites that can provide data sets and assistance with measurement and data analysis, and then broaden this out to look at other resources that may be of use in relation to procurement, contracting and other aspects of commissioning.