The administration of the scheme nationally is in the hands of the Advisory Committee on Clinical Impact Awards. There is a small DHSC Secretariat with the governance of the scheme overseen by a Chair and national Medical Director, both of whom are Public Ministerial Appointees. Between 2018 and 2024 during the reforms of the scheme the Chair was Dr Stuart Dollow and since 2020 the Medical Director has been Professor Kevin Davies. In 2024 Dr Vinay Patroe was appointed as the new Chair. Local awards are administered solely by local NHS Trusts and not at any national level. There are 12 levels of award. Levels 1-8 are awarded locally in various formats by employing NHS Trusts, and levels 10-12 (silver, gold and platinum hereafter) were awarded nationally. These national awards have been replaced by the National 1 to 3 awards. Level 9 awards previously could be awarded locally by Trusts with the same value as a national bronze award, which was awarded nationally. In 2016-17 awards were worth £2,986 for level one, £35,832 for bronze, £47,110 for silver, £58,888 for gold and £76,554 for platinum annually. Payments for these awards were pensionable until 2018 for local awards and 2022 for national awards. Consultants have to reapply after 5 years. 25,300 consultants in England and Wales (54%) received a local or national excellence award in 2016-17. Radical changes or abolition were repeatedly suggested as part of the consultant contract negotiations from 2010 and in 2018 radical changes to the local scheme were agreed between
NHS Employers and the
British Medical Association. New points are now time limited for between one and three years, the award will not be pensionable and will paid annually by lump sum. Legacy awards are unchanged if awarded prior to 2018. These changes did not apply to the national scheme. The national scheme was itself reformed in 2022 to change from the 4 level Bronze to Platinum scheme, awarding 300 pensionable awards a year to the National 1-3 non pensionable scheme granting up to 600 awards of a lower value, to increase opportunity and diversity of the recipients. Applicants provide evidence of national impact that must be dated and be within the last 5 years. The evidence is assessed in five areas: • Domain 1 – Developing and Delivering a high quality service . • Domain 2 – Improving the NHS through leadership. • Domain 3 – Education, training and people development. • Domain 4 – Innovation and Research. • Domain 5 – Additional impact. Other evidence particularly related to NHS priorities or other health objectives The nature of the scheme is balanced across evidence domains to give equal opportunities to reward academic and non academic clinicians being benchmarked against the expectations of their paid job plan. The coalition government conducted a review of the scheme whose report was published in 2012. ==History==