Navigating the CCG maze

by

Clinical commissioning groups. You’ll know they sprung to life in 2013 and commission healthcare services, but how much do you really understand how they work in practice? CCGs are complex and constantly evolving so the textbook theory can be very different to reality.

With pharma’s UK audience becoming ever more payer focused, it’s imperative to have a bird’s eye view of CCG operation.

And at Wordbird, we never put pen to paper without understanding our audience.

To help navigate our way through the CCG maze, we’ve worked with two CCGs. Through training sessions we’ve developed an understanding of:

  • Who the key players are in practice
  • How medicines fit into decision making
  • When and how to approach them

We were surprised by our discoveries. For example, you might envisage clinical senates as privileged ‘specialist advisors’ to CCGs – online research certainly leads to this view. But the reality is different – our CCG trainers had not heard of clinical senates. So beware of strategies directed towards these groups!

And did you know that expertise traditionally provided by ‘clinical support units’ is increasingly being brought in house? Quirks like these can only be uncovered by talking to those inside CCGs.

If you’d like to know more, we’d be delighted to provide you with our unique ‘CCG insights’ presentation. Or, for a whistle-stop tour of CCGs (and to truly appreciate their complexity) watch this fantastic video from the King’s Fund

By Sam Cavenagh, CCG explorer