In July 2000, the NHS Plan set out an ambitious 10-year programme of change and modernisation for the NHS that includes significant investment in technology, capacity and capability to achieve improvements to patient access, contestability, choice, consistency and quality of care. As part of this commitment, the Department of Health's Commercial Directorate is procuring additional healthcare services from the Independent Sector.
The Independent Sector Treatment Centre (ISTC) Programme was launched by The Prime Minister on 30 July 2003. It is focused on supporting the NHS in meeting the Government's targets, ensuring that no NHS patient should wait more than three months for an outpatient appointment and no longer than six months for inpatient treatment.
LOC Consulting assumed overall responsibility for managing the programme management, specifically the programme office and support functions, including the management of relationships with external parties to ensure that all implementation prerequisites were dealt with efficiently.
The programme continues to deliver to the required Government deadlines and is under-pinned by an effective and seamless programme infrastructure. By deploying the required programme support processes, including time management, knowledge and information management programme office functionality and stakeholder management the programme is well positioned to deliver against the baselined plan approved by Ministers.