Frimley Health has won its bid to provide more integrated community services to north east Hampshire, Farnham and Surrey Heath, ensuring local patients are treated closer to home.

As existing providers, the Trust and Virgin Care Services Limited have been awarded the contracts by local NHS commissioners to provide a package of services, worth £17m per year, to patients at home and in the community.

North East Hampshire and Farnham clinical commissioning group (CCG) and Surrey Heath CCG awarded the contracts, which will run from 1 April 2020 until March 2025, with a possible extension until 2027. The CCGs intend the contracts to strengthen collaboration between existing local health and social care partners within the Frimley Health and Care Integrated Care System. Social care, mental health services and GPs, part of the newly formed Primary Care Networks and existing local GP Federations, will be working closer together to deliver the right care at the right time and in the right place.

Frimley Health chief executive Neil Dardis said: "I'm delighted we've won this bid to expand ​our provision of local community services, which is ​a key element of our new Trust strategy launched in September.

“Our five-year plan is all about working with our local partners to enable patients to get joined-up, quality care closer to home, as well as helping them stay out of hospital and better manage their health and wellbeing. The award of this contract is a vote of confidence in our ability to do this and to successfully integrate our acute services even further with GP services, community mental health services and social care. In the future, local patients can expect to see our hospital​​ specialists working even more closely with community health and care professionals, resulting in seamless, high quality care.”

The move, announced on 19 September, will see Frimley Health and Virgin provide some services together across both north east Hampshire and Farnham, and the Surrey Heath areas. The Trust has been providing community services in North East Hampshire, including community nursing, intermediate care and rehab, specialist nursing and community inpatients, since January 2017. The five-year contract extends our collaborative working into Surrey Heath and Farnham. It reinforces the importance of working in an integrated way in our local communities to provide a joined-up, seamless service for patients and their carers.

Nicola Airey, commissioning lead for the CCGs’ procurement process, said: “We are delighted that Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust and Virgin Care Services Limited have been successful in their bids to provide these vital services to our local communities. We were looking for organisations who are able to drive quality improvement, innovate, and collaborate with the wider integrated care community to further develop the work we have done together to date.

“We look forward to working with the providers to continue to build their services and ensure that local people are cared for and supported by an integrated team of professionals in their own homes or local communities.”