The system provides a live prior approval IT tool to reduce administrative burden to the NHS and ensure treatments are funded by NHS England only for patients meeting defined treatment criteria. This prior approval system is included in the Specialised commissioning NHS Standard contract agreed with providers.
There are two main commissioning bodies that use a prior approval system within NHS England: The Managed Access Funds (Cancer Drugs Fund and Innovative Medicines Fund) and Routine Commissioning.
Amongst the features of the operating model for the commissioning bodies is a single web-based registration system and an IT infrastructure which supports web-based access for all clinicians across the country. There are also common operating procedures and the ability to produce common reports around activity and expenditure.

We are looking to undertake a discovery phase to understand which Suppliers can host the system with finances available.