Commissioning Support Officer

Job overview

The Commissioning Support Officer will be the responsible operational lead for the co-ordination and day to day management of:

• Individual Patient Funding Requests (IPFR) and appeals for Cwm Taf Morgannwg UHB in line with the All Wales Policy for making decisions on IPFR.
• Prior Approval (Non Contracted Activity) for NHS treatments that fall within and outside the UHB’s contractual framework and facilitate repatriation of patients back to local services where appropriate.
• Supporting the Welsh Health Specialised Services (WHSSC) referral management process.
• Supporting operational, planning and commissioning colleagues in reviewing and amending contract agreements such as SLAs and LTAs.

This post is fixed term/secondment to cover for maternity leave. Minimum 9 months, possible extension to 12 months. Anyone wishing to apply for the post as a secondment must seek approval from their Line Manager before applying.

Main duties of the job

• Support the Head of Commissioning in ensuring the Health Board is compliant with the All Wales Prior Approval (PAR) and NHS Wales Policy Making Decisions on Individual Patient Funding Requests (IPFR).
• Review applications, ensure all supporting information is collated.
• Where appropriate, decision making when considering PAR applications.
• Provide administration support for the panel meetings and maintain associated audit trail.
• Communicating funding application decisions.
• Maintaining the IPFR/PAR database.
• Updating the national IPFR database.

Welsh Skills Desirable: This post is advertised as Welsh Desirable. This doesn’t mean essential; whilst the candidate doesn't need to have skills in Welsh, we'll consider it an advantage when short-listing and selecting candidates. This isn’t ‘fluency’, just Speaking & Listening skills at Level 3 (equivalent to CEFR B2) or above. Level 3 means basic conversations with patients about their everyday health. For more information, see ‘Welsh Language Guidance’ in the documents right at the bottom.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

• Support the co-ordination and administration of all aspects of the Cwm Taf Morgannwg UHB IPFR panel including taking notes of the panel meetings and preparing outcome notes and letters for the IPFR lead, ensuring there is an appropriate audit trail on the decisions making of the IPFR panel.
• Responsible for ensuring that IPFR & PAR requests are dealt with in a timely equitable and effective manner, ensuring the administration of the requests adheres to the All Wales policies in terms of process including time scales and acknowledgements etc.
• Review all IPFR applications, prior approval (Non Contracted Activity) requests and requests for treatment abroad to ensure that agreed processes within the policy are adhered to, including timescales, record keeping etc. This will include ensuring all documentation is completed, requesting information and supporting documentation as required either as identified by the post holder or by the IPFR lead.
• Provide advice and support to internal and external colleagues on the IPFR process, prior approval (Non-Contracted Activity) process, treatment abroad, and on individual IPFR, prior approval cases as required.
• Be responsible for ensuring systems and processes are in place to monitor IPFR in line with internal and external quality standards, including the management of the IPFR database.

In addition if Katie Games is unavailable, please contact:

Claire Tynan- Preece: Commissioning Manager: Claire.Tynan-Preece@wales.nhs.uk

Applicant requirements

Welsh language skills are desirable