I have read there are some changes to the vacs and imms this year, what are the main changes?

Answered by Tracy Green

Vaccinations and immunisations are now an essential service rather than an additional service, with all practices expected to offer all routine, pre- and post-exposure vaccinations, and NHS travel vaccinations to their registered eligible population. The global sum is protected, in line with the five-year agreement, and will continue to cover NHS travel vaccinations and pre- and post-prophylaxis vaccinations.

New core standards are now in place for the provision of vaccination and immunisation services to address historical differences in practice’s approaches and new technology. There are five core components:

1. All practices must have a named lead for vaccination services
2. Practices must ensure the availability of sufficient trained staff and convenient, timely appointments to cover 100% of their eligible population
3. Practices must ensure their call and recall and opportunistic offers are made in line with national standards
4. Practices must participate in agreed national catch-up campaigns
5. Practices must adhere to defined standards for record keeping and reporting of coverage data – for contract monitoring, payment purposes and coverage monitoring.

Payment Changes The Standard Item of Service (IoS) fee is £10.06, fixed for the next three years.

The move to an IoS payment means that practices are rewarded for the extra work of an additional vaccine. This could benefit practices who achieve less than the 70% target for child immunisations and pre-school boosters who currently do not receive any payment at all for this work. However, where practices do not achieve a minimum of 79% coverage for routine childhood vaccines there will be a clawback.

Full information can be found here Update to the GP contract agreement 2020/21 – 2023/24 6 February 2020