Title: Methods of Mobilizing Clinical Engagement and Clinical Leadership by Clinical Commissioning Groups
Funder: Department of Health (England)

Abstract: The Clinical Commissioning Groups have been charged with engaging clinicians and promoting clinical leadership in service redesign in search of improved quality innovation and productivity. There is renewed concern across the NHS with the quality of leadership and the ability of leaders to assure patient safety and wellbeing. These challenges correspond with a period of severe budget constraint. Against this backcloth our research project will track the variety of ways and the extent to which CCGs go about meeting the challenge of engaging clinical leaders in the redesign of services. Further we will track the extent to which these efforts lead to effective achievement of more co-ordinated models of care. These are widely regarded as necessary in order to meet public health challenges through prevention and chronic disease management. The extent to which CCGs seek to develop services based on existing clinical clusters or networks and /or create new arrangements and relationships will be of focal interest. So too will be the way in which service priorities are conceptualised and outcomes measured as a result of clinical engagement and clinical leadership. Our research findings will crystallise key features of effective clinical leadership in service redesign speeding learning across the population of CCGs. These objectives can be expressed as a set of Research Questions (elaborated in the relevant section below): What is the range of clinical engagement modes being used by CCGs? What is the scope nature and extent of clinical leadership and engagement in service redesign and how are these enabled and facilitated by these bodies? What are the forces and factors that appear to be enabling and blocking the achievement of benefits in different contexts? What can be learned from international practices of clinical leadership in service redesign that will contribute to effective clinical leadership in CCGs? To answer these questions the project has been designed as a series of phases. These include: a systematic analysis of the application documents produced by CCGs; a national telephone survey of CCGs using multiple respondents to document the baseline of plans and initial steps regarding clinical engagement and leadership and the nature of benefits being sought; an intensive analysis of six case studies of CCGs which will delve in depth into the processes used to engage clinical leaders and the behaviours of a range of clinicians (from both primary and acute care). Each case will look at clinical leadership and engagement frameworks put in place across the CCG and will study in depth the relationship between clinical leadership and service improvement in selected clinical areas. These selected areas will represent a variety of service types involving both NHS and local authority services and so require concerted service redesign efforts. The next phase will be a follow-up national telephone sample of CCGs to gauge the prevalence as well as the variations in promising practices uncovered by the case studies. This will be followed by web-based multimedia seminars with international research groups working on clinical leadership and service redesign issues in internationally leading health systems Dissemination will include the production of a guidance document for CCGs on achieving the benefits of service redesign through clinical engagement and leadership.


Research activity codes: 8.3 POLICY, ETHICS AND RESEARCH GOVERNANCE
Health categories: GENERIC HEALTH RELEVANCE