Tower Hamlets Wheelchair Services

Tender description

Service for the provision of wheelchair and postural seating services for children and adults, including equipment maintenance and repair facilities and client review programmes in keeping with nationally recognised standards. The service will provide a comprehensive service for people of all ages with long term mobility problems and associated postural needs in accordance with statutory requirements (see section 1.4). The service will provide for the clinical needs along with consideration of the holistic needs of the user (including social, educational, lifestyle and family/carer requirements). The service will also provide equipment maintenance and repair facilities and client review programmes in keeping with nationally recognised standards. A requirement of this contract is that the provider will comply with the principles of ‘Child in a Chair in a Day ’ throughout the service for all service users. Child in a chair in a day requires organisations to put in place a referral process, an assessment of the child for the right equipment solution, so that equipment is delivered within the required timeframe. The service will provide advice on mobility equipment and seating, provide training in basic wheelchair prescription to staff and prescribers from acute and community based health staff and social care services in the area. The service’s therapists will work in an integrated way with rehabilitation engineers and manufacturers to further product development to enhance future wheelchair design. Objectives The service shall provide: • A referral and triage system for access to the service that includes the minimum national data set • Timely multiagency (where relevant) clinically based comprehensive holistic assessment that also takes account of carers, parents and families abilities. These should be carried out in an appropriate environment to enable the user and assessor to achieve a fully informed outcome. • Information at the time of referral to enable the individual and their parents /carers to make informed decisions regarding care and requirements. • A Prescription (based on need) of manual and/or powered wheelchairs as part of the assessment process • Access to the voucher scheme to promote user choice regarding provision of equipment from the service • Support, information and scheduled reassessments at the time of first assessment. • Flexible and proactive services for those children and adults with rapidly deteriorating conditions • As part of the requirements for Long Term Conditions (LTC)* the individuals agreed care plan is to be an integral part of the process. *A Long Term Condition is defined as a condition that cannot, at present be cured; but can be controlled by medication and other therapies. Examples of Long Term Conditions are diabetes, heart disease and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Annual contract is approx. 850k The contract financial envelope includes CQUIN as per national guidance.