Congratulations on a new research grant
Chris Lonsdale, Russell Mannion (HSMC) and Joe Sanderson have been awarded £90,460 by the National Institute for Health Research to undertake a 9 month project entitled ‘Towards a framework for enhancing procurement and supply chain management practice in the NHS: lessons for managers and clinicians from a synthesis of the theoretical and empirical literature’. Joe is the principal investigator and the team will be working with a full-time research fellow. The project starts on 1st May.
This study will provide a better understanding of the range of different approaches to mapping, evaluating and improving procurement and supply chain management practice and how these might be applied to help NHS managers and clinicians in their procurement activities, in particular in light of recent and planned changes to commissioning in the NHS. It will provide a guide (framework) based on ideas and on evidence for managers and clinicians to work from.
It begins with a review of what is known about procurement and supply chain management across all sectors and in different countries, followed by a review which focuses on procurement and supply chain management in healthcare, in the UK and elsewhere. This review is then brought together in a summary (synthesis) of both the key ideas (theories) and practices in procurement and supply chain management. This synthesis will take the form of a main story and will explain the main ideas and practices rather than judge them. The study will then focus on the relevance of this main story for healthcare in general and for the NHS in particular.