Clinical Quality Assurance (CQA) is one key part of how we develop and manage our framework agreements. It helps ensure that quality, safety, and patient outcomes are considered throughout the framework lifecycle, from early development and specification design through to post-award review and continuous improvement.
Using a range of clinical quality standards, our clinical teams work alongside category, procurement, and commercial colleagues to identify and address quality and safety considerations at an early stage. This helps ensure framework specifications are informed by clinical evidence, user feedback, and patient experience, while supporting consistent and robust decision-making.
Our approach extends beyond framework development. Clinical quality remains a continuous focus after contract award, helping us identify emerging issues, share learning, and support ongoing improvement across our frameworks.
By embedding clinical quality throughout the process, we aim to provide assurance to stakeholders that patient safety, clinical effectiveness and the needs of patients and end users remain at the heart of what we do.
Areas considered as part of our Clinical Quality Assurance approach include:
- Health inequalities.
- Mitigation of quality and safety concerns.
- Clinical effectiveness.
- End-user engagement in specifications.
- Patient engagement in specifications.
- Human factors considerations.