There's not much lurve for companies that sell stuff to the NHS. I get that but the truth is, we need partnerships that give us ideas, better, safer and more efficient ways of doing things. But it is tricky...
Pharma... well, we all know the history. Device manufacturers all but ignored and companies contracting for NHS, patient-facing contracts are treated, in some quarters, like lepers.
There is another side to the coin... the NHS pound. There are some services that the NHS is not good at and companies and partners can do a great job with us and for us.
I'm no fan of tendering; the bureaucracy-costs, the process is torturous and anyway, most of the players have fallen by the way-side. Or, end-up like Virgin, threatening to sue their customers.
Let's not forget the centre-piece; Hinchingbrooke Hospital. Investors,
C
ircle lost £5m trying to run it and paid another £2m to get out of running it.
Let's park all that. There's no money in healthcare, tendering and commissioning is dying a death.
What I am much more bothered about is pharma and the kit-n-caboodle makers.
Although we all think the NHS is jolly-fine, it is only 3% of the global market. Despite the PPRS and NICE, we do manage to get pharma to launch products here, partly because of the cachet the NHS has (remember the opening of the Olympics), because top-pharma people like living here, the timezones work, Heathrow is a hub, we speak English, it's safe for their families and Waitrose.
However, the European Medicines Agency is Brexiting. A disaster. Apart from the loss of jobs and there is a queue of EU countries who see the benefits of playing host, we are mad to let them go because we'll end up waiting months to buy new drugs, already available to bigger markets.
The EU is 25% of the global market. You see my point.
We can't fix that. We will have to develop our own regulator, with all the attendant costs just to duplicate the EU. The three people left at NICE will end up evaluating corn-plasters...
My other worry; the kit-n-caboodle people. We must have a good supply of consumables, devices, equipment and new ideas.
Aside from a post-Brexit tariff-import concatenation
we could do without, selling to the NHS is a nightmare.
There's no front door. Over 150 Trusts and a central tendering system that was invented by someone with a Phd in deterring-participation...
an EU invention. It'll be replaced with something equally labyrinthine.
Add to that, about 8,300 GP practices and 212 CCGs, community hospitals and services and all the rest.
If you are selling to the NHS, bear in mind; CCGs are disappearing, less and less influential in buying things. STPs will take on the role of strategic health authorities and far too remote to buy things. So, good luck.
Accountable Care Organisations are creeping up on us. They will only want products and kit that can span primary and secondary care. A trick very few companies have been able to pull off. Good luck with that.
Let's say you have a really good, value for money gismo or consumable that the NHS would find handy, help reduce costs and improve outcomes. How will you sell it to the NHS?
You could try and get it listed, FP10... prescribed. The NHS is trying to cut the prescription Bill.
Good luck with that.
You could wear out your shoes traipsing around knocking on +9,000 doors.
Good luck with that.
Use your phone book? You'll find the people you once knew, have been made redundant, moved to a new job or retired. Good luck with that.
You could produce a fabulous business-case, highlighting a wow-return-on-investment and flash it about like a fly fisherman with a Gold Ribbed Hare's Ear on a still, summer evening. Good luck with that.
The NHS is preoccupied with reorganisation, cuts, fighting off regulators and struggling to recruit and retain staff. Interest them in anything new? Good luck with that.
The NHS is set to save £30bn by 2020, or whatever that translates into after the election. A big slice will depend on adopting new ideas, innovations, product developments and new stuff.
That means the NHS will have to try them, evaluate them, use them, tweak them and make them sweat.
But, first, they'll have to find them... good luck with that.
Good luck with that...
