This briefing paper uses five case studies of health economies in the English NHS as a basis for examining how local clinicians and managers are working together to develop closer service integration and less fragmented care for patients. It focuses on what is facilitating or impeding change and sets out proposals for policy-makers that are designed to enable more rapid progress towards develop...

This chapter summarises the evidence assembled in the previous chapters covering different aspects of the market-related reforms of the English National Health Service (NHS) under New Labour. It tries to assess the extent to which the objectives of the reforms had been met or the concerns of sceptics vindicated by the time that New Labour lost power in May 2010. It concludes by discussing the n...

martin powell makes the point that the death of the national health service (nhs) is constantly asserted without criteria. this article suggests that the nhs is many things, which makes criteria unstable. the alignment of interests in the structure of the nhs enables both overheated rhetoric and political strength, and that pluralization of provision might actually undermine that alignment over...

Martin Powell makes the point that the death of the National Health Service (NHS) is constantly asserted without criteria. This article suggests that the NHS is many things, which makes criteria unstable. The alignment of interests in the structure of the NHS enables both overheated rhetoric and political strength, and that pluralization of provision might actually undermine that alignment over...

Recent changes in the English National Health Service (NHS) have introduced new complexities into the accountability arrangements for healthcare services. This commentary describes how the new organizational structures have challenged the traditional centralized accountability structures by creating a more dispersed system of governance for local health-care commissioners. It sets the context o...

Following the Public Enquiry into avoidable deaths and poor standards of care at Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust, the English National Health Service (NHS) is aiming to become a system devoted to continual learning and improvement of patient care. The paper aims to explore current perceptions of healthcare staff towards reporting and organisational learning for improving patient safety. ...

The provision of performance information is essential for ensuring and improving the performance of health care systems. However, the lack of reliable quality information is a key problem in evaluating and improving health care. This paper estimates the performance of English NHS Acute Trusts using Dr. Foster data from the years 1996 – 2008 to investigate health outcomes after elective treatmen...