The two Investment and Impact Fund (IIF) indicators remain the same for PCNs in 2025/26, worth a maximum of £13 million.
In the Network DES contract document released last week, PCNs will continue to focus on two national clinical priorities: tackling health inequalities and cancer within the IIF(see box for full indicators).
The funding available for IIF remains the same as in 2024/25, however a contract document has clarified that this will be a ‘maximum’ amount.
For 2025/26, PCNs can achieve a maximum of 58 IIF points, with £198 per point multiplied by a list size adjustment and prevalence adjustment.
For the tackling health inequalities area, PCNs must record the percentage of patients on the learning disability register, as defined by the statement of financial entitlements, aged 14 years and over who receive a learning disability annual health check and a health action plan, alongside recording their ethnicity.
However, the contract document stated that following ‘concerns’ about patients being inappropriately added to the disability register due to associated diagnosis and SNOMED coding, that a removal code will be available.
On the second indicator, which relates to faecal immunochemical testing (FIT) alongside urgent suspected cancer referrals, the document said the implementation of FIT has had a ‘positive impact’ on lower GI referral volumes.
It said: ‘Recent data has shown that referrals for all cancers are 2.3% above the pre-pandemic trend, while lower GI referrals are 14.1% below the trend.
‘At the same time, there has been an increase in the proportion of lower GI urgent suspected cancer referrals that result in a cancer diagnosis, and no significant change to the trend in lower GI detection rates. This suggests that FIT is supporting the most appropriate patients to be referred for colonoscopy.’
IIF Indicators
Tackling health inequalities domain
HI03 – percentage of patients on the Learning Disability register (as defined in the SFE) aged 14 years or over, who received an annual Learning Disability Health Check and have a completed Health Action Plan in addition to a recording of ethnicity. Points: 36; Lower threshold: 60% and Upper Threshold: 80%.
Cancer domain
CAN04 – the proportion of patients who have had a lower gastrointestinal urgent suspected cancer referral in the reporting year where at least one urgent suspected cancer referral was accompanied by a faecal immunochemical test result, with the result recorded in the 21 days leading up to the referral. Points: 22; Lower threshold: 65% and Upper threshold: 80%.
This article was first published by our sister title Pulse PCN
