Organizing care

Commissioning any service within the National Health Service (NHS) involves planning, agreeing, organizing, and monitoring services. However, this simple statement hides a complex world that is dependent on an understanding of epidemiology of populations, of complex datasets within those populations, health needs assessments, evidence appraisal, and a knowledge of service specification, contracting, negotiating, and procurement. Planning and organizing podiatry care within the UK NHS falls behind such ‘giants’ as cancer, diabetes, and heart disease, but slow progress is occurring. This chapter will cover the background to commissioning and organizing care within the NHS with specific reference to the field of podiatry.