National Clinical Impact Awards (formerly Clinical Excellence Awards)

The Advisory Committee on Clinical Impact Awards (ACCIA) has made some important changes to the National Clinical Impact Awards (NCIA) award scheme ahead of its 2023 round. Applicants will no longer be expected to obtain a ranking and citation from a National Nominating Body (NNB) as part of their submission.

NCIA will no longer have a system whereby NNOs nominate and provide ‘recommendations’, ranking and citations. No-one will have any sort of citation (apart from employer sign off) – all the forms will have the same structure. ACCIA want organisations to encourage members to apply and point them in the direction of generic guidance (see below). Further help can be obtained by watching the informational webinars, one for applicants and the other for employers here.

ACCIA policy is to broaden access to the scheme and for applicants to be able to attain higher award levels more quickly, encouraging more applications from traditionally under-represented groups and specialties. As such ACCIA have expanded on the current NNO lists to work with a greater number of relevant external membership organisations.

For 2023, BSACI will be able to provide guidance and assistance to an unlimited number of members to augment the quality of their applications, through the use of checklists and guidance (see below) as well as review forms to provide more tailored guidance for individuals. These we hope will be helpful in avoiding common pitfalls that negatively affect an applicant’s score, but we will not be able to edit, proof read or specifically advise on the text of an application.

The 2023 round opens on 3rd March and closes on 28th April (8 weeks). Timetable of the round this year:

• 3 March to 28 April 2023 – applications open
• 29 April to 26 June 2023 – first round scoring
• 27 June to 4 September – N3 scoring
• 27 June to 6 November – governance review
• 5 September to 6 November – NRES scoring
• end November 2023 – main committee finalisation of recommendations
• December 2023 – recommendations to and sign off by ministers
• mid-January 2024 – notifications sent to successful applicants and finance processes initiated to back pay awards
• mid-January to mid-February 2024 – appeals window open

ACCIA has recently published more information on the new role that Member Organisations play in the NCIA process, this can be found at the following link: New ACCIA process for awards scheme applications – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

Further information on the 2023 awards can be found here.

Below are some of the helpful resources that BSACI have been sent by ACCIA which we wish to share with members to help them with their application.  However please do get in touch with [email protected] if you require further advice or guidance.