The objective of the study was to examine the links between inputs into the process of nursing, in particular, the skill mix of nursing staff and the outputs of nursing in terms of the quality and outcome of care. The review of literature revealed several ambiguities and conceptual problems at...

Joint finance is money allocated by the Department of Health to NHS authorities to promote policies of inter-agency collaboration which prevent people being admitted to hospital or facilitate earlier discharge from hospital or save on NHS resources generally. Worries have been expressed that...

The allocation of resources to health and social care agencies for services for people with learning disabilities has long been a source of debate and disagreement, centring around the failure of the balance of financing to reflect the increasing consensus that the overwhelming need of people...

This paper is concerned with the provision of long-stay care for the elderly in a district Health Authority. The major alternative forms of care compared are NHS long-stay hospital and the use of "contract beds" in private nursing homes. "Contract beds" are beds occupied by NHS patients and paid...

The objective of this paper is to cost the schemes currently in operation. The costs have been calculated on a real resource basis (with the exception of the loss of leisure time voluntarily surrended by ambulance staff, instructors, nurses and clinicians, although the effects of this omission...

This paper consists of a review of economic evaluations of mental health care. The conclusion which emerges from this review is that the existing literature is lacking in both quantity and quality. Only seven evaluations of both the costs and effects of alternative forms of mental health care...

The main purpose of this paper is to measure the costs of small (i.e. less than 50 beds) NHS units for the care of mentally handicapped persons in the community and to compare these costs with those of hospital care standardising wherever possible for resident characteristics such as age and...

This paper summarises the cost-effectiveness work which has been carried out on alternative patterns of care for elderly people, people with a mental handicap and people with chronic mental illness. The amount of work completed varies according to the client group concerned. There is, for...

The recent reorganisation of community care removed many of the perverse incentives identified in the previous system. However, the organisation of care for many people is still divided across several agencies in the public and independent sectors. As purchasing and providing agencies in both...