This paper has been written as a contribution to the work of the NHS Future Forum and in support of the government’s espoused aim of placing integrated care at the heart of the programme of NHS reform. Integrated care is essential to meet the needs of the ageing population, transform ...
Integration of health and social care is a core policy aim of the new coalition government in England. It has several benefits for patients, particularly older people and those with long-term conditions. But how does integration work in practice? This paper sets out how one particular area – Torbay – ...
Increasing demands on general practice over the past five years - not just a heavier workload but the increasing complexity and intensity of work - have led to a feeling of crisis. The NHS is finding it difficult to recruit and retain sufficient GPs who want to do full-time, patient-facing ... and This report is accompanied by 'A day in the life of a GP'. This typical day in the life of a GP draws on the experiences of several GPs working in different practices who we spoke to as part of the research for this report. It has been reviewed by ...
In November 2011, The King’s Fund invited academics, practitioners, policy-makers and representatives from patient and voluntary organisations to discuss the care of very old frail people with complex health problems. Mindful of the work of others (NHS Confederation, the Local Government Association and Age UK 2012; The Mid Staffordshire NHS ...
This paper introduces a way of conceptualising and measuring engagement that is known as ‘patient activation’. Patient activation provides a better understanding of why some patients engage fully with their health and others do not. More
importantly, the study of patient activation has led to the design of many effective ...
The King’s Fund visited six services where consultants are delivering or facilitating care outside hospital. This report presents the findings from those visits as case studies. It identifies key characteristics and challenges to this way of working and seeks out evidence of the benefits to patients and the NHS more ...
This report synthesises evidence from seven case studies covering Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States. It considers similarities and differences of programmes that are successfully delivering integrated care, and identifies lessons for policy-makers and service providers to help them address the challenges ...
This case study looks at integrated teams of health and social care professionals, known as community resource teams (CRTs), who work to co-ordinate care for people living at home in the largely rural county of Pembrokeshire. This model of care is one aspect of a wider strategic programme of integrated ...
This case study is part of a research project undertaken by The King’s Fund and funded by Aetna and the Aetna Foundation in the USA to compare five successful UK-based models of care co-ordination (see Appendix 1 for methods used to collect the study data). The aim of each case ...
People with long-term physical health conditions - the most frequent users of health care services - commonly experience mental health problems such as depression and anxiety, or dementia in the case of older people. As a result of these co-morbid problems, the prognosis for their long-term condition and the quality ...