Against a background of apparent official disinterest in monitoring of the NHS reforms, the King's Fund decided to make such evaluative work the focus of a major grants programme. Seven projects have been selected for financial support, each to run over a three year period, 1990-1993. The work of the projects is being co-ordinated on behalf of the Grants Committee by the King's Fund Institute. The projects are: monitoring managed competition; the NHS reforms and hospital costs; medical audit in hospitals; general practice fundholding; the changing face of human resource management; evaluating the impact of the NHS reforms on elderly patients; and patient choice and changes to the referral system. Contact names are provided with details of each project.