Community services: How they can transform care

"The ambition to move care closer to home has resulted in some reduction in lengths of stay in hospital, but further significant changes are needed in the way care is delivered."

Community services: How they can transform care
Nigel Edwards
The King's Fund
February 2014

Read more here.

Service transformation: Lessons from mental health

"Some commentators have drawn parallels between the process of transformation in mental health services and what is now desired in other parts of the health system. However, there has been little detailed exploration of how far that comparison is valid or of the lessons that can be learnt. This report takes mental health services for adults in England as a case study and examines the relevance of this experience to current policy."

Service transformation: Lessons from mental health
Helen Gilburt, Edward Peck, Beccy Ashton, Nigel Edwards, Chris Naylor
The King's Fund
February 2014

Read more here.

Commissioning and funding general practice

"This paper describes the current system of commissioning and funding general practice and how this is being used in four areas of England to develop innovative models of primary care provision."

Commissioning and funding general practice: Making the case for family care networks
Rachael Addicott, Chris Ham
The King's Fund
February 2014

Read more here.

How is the health and social care system performing?

"The Quarterly monitoring report combines publicly available data on selected NHS performance measures with views from NHS trust finance directors, clinical commissioning group (CCG) finance leads, and local authority directors of adult social services."

How is the health and social care system performing? Quarterly monitoring report
The King's Fund
January 2014

Read more here.

Providing integrated care for older people with complex needs

"This report synthesises evidence from seven case study programmes, each from a different country, that are successfully delivering integrated health and social care for older people with complex needs. The aim is to identify lessons for policy-makers and service providers to help them improve how care is designed and co-ordinated."

Providing integrated care for older people with complex needs: Lessons from seven international case studies
Nick Goodwin, Anna Dixon, Geoff Anderson, Walter Wodchis
The King's Fund
January 2014

Read more here.

NHS safe staffing: not just a number

"The greatest running cost of the NHS is its workforce. The authors show how this aspect of the NHS can too easily be neglected in the policy process, or discussed only in the context of concerns for costs of the NHS payroll...We try to identify some of the potential clinical and financial benefits from more robust workforce data, and the barriers that limit progress towards the adoption of digital technology for the closely linked tasks of rostering, payment, and quality assurance."

NHS safe staffing: not just a number
Tony Hockley, Sean Boyle
London School of Economics and Political Science
January 2014

Read more here.

Capturing Value from Health Technologies in Lean Times

"This Commentary focuses on an emerging, evidence-based policy tool called Health Technology Assessment (HTA). HTA helps inform decision making on how to balance demand and supply pressures for new technologies within a health-system budget. The overarching objective is to obtain the greatest health gains within fiscal constraints by grounding decisions in a clear, transparent and coordinated process."

Capturing Value from Health Technologies in Lean Times
Åke Blomqvist, Colin Busby and Don Husereau
C.D. Howe Institute Commentary,  No. 396 (Canada)
December 2013

Read more here.

Speaking up for patient safety by hospital-based health care professionals

"This review focused on health care professionals’ speaking-up behaviour for patient safety and aimed at (1) assessing the effectiveness of speaking up, (2) evaluating the effectiveness of speaking-up training, (3) identifying the factors influencing speaking-up behaviour, and (4) developing a model for speaking-up behaviour."

Speaking up for patient safety by hospital-based health care professionals: a literature review
Ayako Okuyama, Cordula Wagner and Bart Bijnen

BMC Health Services Research, 2014, 14:61 

Read more here.

'Any town' toolkit for Clinical Commissioning Groups

"NHS England has produced a toolkit called ‘Any town’, which using high level health system modelling, allows clinical commissioning groups to map how interventions could improve local health services and close the financial gap."

The toolkit includes five modules accessible as PowerPoint presentations:

1 -  Methodology guide
2 -  Urban model module
3 -  Suburban model module
4 -  Rural model module
5 -  Further information guide (containing additional case study information)

Any Town
NHS England
January 2014

Read more here.

Focus On: Distance from home to emergency care

"This QualityWatch Focus On report examines the typical distances from home that people travel to receive emergency care, and how this has changed over time. It explores the distances between a person’s home and the hospital at which they attended A&E, or received an emergency inpatient admission, using Hospital Episode Statistics."

Focus On: Distance from home to emergency care
A Roberts, I Blunt, M Bardsley
The Health Foundation and the Nuffield Trust, London
February 2014

Read more here.

Digital First: Clinical Transformation through Pathology Innovation

"Using pathology services differently must be based on improving quality of care as well as increasing efficency. Pathology underpins the majority of clinical interactions and clinical value chains can only be unlocked if pathology services are coordinated in concert with clinical services. The gains from digitisation described in this report accrue when pathways are joined up across care settings and clinical networks. Quality is a major part of the equation in achieving value."

Digital First: Clinical Transformation through Pathology Innovation
National Pathology Programme, NHS England
February 2014

Read more here.

Shine: Improving the value of local healthcare services

"This learning report shares the successes and lessons from the first two rounds of the Health Foundation’s Shine programme: annual awards to test small-scale innovative interventions that aim to improve the quality, safety and value of healthcare services."

Shine: Improving the value of local healthcare services
The Health Foundation, London
February 2014

Read more here.