Market Engagement Webinar - ASD Post-Diagnostic Psychoeducational Resource for Parents/Carers and Young People in Greater Essex

The NHS Long Term Plan is committed to improving the assessment and support of children and young people (CYP) who may be autistic. To help achieve this, partners from health and care across Southend, Essex and Thurrock have secured investment from NHS England & Improvement to carry out a project which delivers innovation to autism diagnostic and post-diagnostic pathways for children and young people. NHS Mid and South Essex Integrated Care Board (ICB), NHS Suffolk and North East Essex ICB, and Hertfordshire and West Essex ICB as the joint participating Contracting Authorities (herein referred to as 'the Authority') intend to develop develop a post-diagnostic psychoeducational resource offer, focusing on parents, carers and families across a spectrum of age ranges, with the addition of a young person specific resource offer, to be developed young people aged 12-18 (25yrs with SEND). The proposal is to commission a suitably qualified and experienced provider to design, develop, digitise and pilot two psychoeducational resources packages, one that is evidence-based therapeutic intervention that provides information and support to better understanding and cope with autism, for parents/carers of children following a process for diagnosis and another psychoeducational resource for young people following a process for diagnosis. The ambition of the programme is to develop and pilot at scale across the complex landscape of Southend, Essex and Thurrock. The Authority is seeking input from interested suppliers to take part in a pre-procurement Market Engagement Event, which will be held virtually as a webinar and broadcast via Microsoft (MS) Teams. The format of the event will be a presentation from the commissioners followed by a Q&A. The information gathered will support commissioners to understand better the service model to put in place and will be used to inform the approach to the procurement process.