Minuteful Kidney Service

The purpose of this notice is to inform the market of a contract which has been awarded to Healthy.io to deliver the Minuteful Kidney service within Hertfordshire and West Essex.

This is a fully outsourced, end-to-end home testing service provided by Healthy.io. The service enables patients to deliver their own annual kidney health urine test without visiting a GP practice via postal testing kits and with a smartphone app. The outcome is improvement of early detection of kidney disease and prevention of cardiovascular disease, improving health outcomes and reducing long term costs of care.

This is a pilot service which will be made available to all practices across Hertfordshire and West Essex. The intended benefits of which are:

An increase in uptake of urine ACR testing, Increase in completion of all 8 care processes (as this is often the care process that is missing), Increased detection of kidney disease in a high-risk population, Longer term benefits of reduced complications and adverse outcomes from undiagnosed or poorly managed CKD and DM.

It can be used in any setting where the patient has access to a test kit and a smartphone. The system has interoperability with GP systems which allows results to be submitted immediately to the patients practice.

The contract has been awarded to Healthy.io recognising that this is an emerging technology with a limited market. In September 2020, Healthy.io were selected by the NHS for the Artificial Intelligence in Health and Care Award as one of several recipients chosen from a pool of over 530 applicants to deploy technologies to NHS sites and transform care. The company has been awarded a share of £50 million from a total pot of £140 million over three years to deploy technologies to NHS sites. They are also the only provider that delivers a smartphone-based home kidney testing service which improves access to care for hundreds of thousands of people in the UK. The award is run by the Accelerated Access Collaborative (AAC), in partnership with NHSX and the National Institute of Health Research (NIHR).

The pilot project will be subject to ongoing evaluation, should this evaluation deem the service to deliver the positive impacts for patients market testing will be undertaken to allow the ICB to understand whether new providers / technologies have emerged. A commissioning and procurement decision on the long-term future of the service will be based on the evidence gathered.

The value included within this notice is inclusive of VAT. The value exclusive of VAT is £121,800.

As this was not a competitive process, the closing date included within this Notice is the date by which the waiver was submitted.