Health Management and Policy Alert

Transfers of care toolkit

Professional Record Standards Body -
High volumes of patients are transferred every day between health and care settings. This toolkit concentrates on the PRSB eDischarge Summary Standard, which specifies the data to be shared between secondary and primary care to support the discharge of a patient from hospitals across the UK. It does not propose a one-size-fits-all approach and recognises that health and care services are organised in different ways across the UK.

• Toolkit

 

Route 2 pathway: from healthcare support worker to registered nurse

NHS Employers - 

University Hospital Dorset NHS Trust developed the Route 2 pathway for existing internationally educated nurses (IENs) in health care support worker (HCSW) roles, helping them to take part in a fast-tracked Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) course to support them with becoming a registered nurse here in the UK.

• Case study

Improving our nation’s health: a whole-of-government approach to tackling the causes of long-term sickness and economic inactivity

NHS Confederation - 

The UK faces a series of complex health challenges, exemplified by the recent sharp rise in the number of people out of the workforce due to long-term sickness. This has significant impacts on individuals’ wellbeing, as well as large fiscal and economic costs. Tackling complex challenges such as this requires a fresh approach. This interim report, developed by the NHS Confederation and Boston Consulting Group, sets out why a whole-of-government approach is key to addressing this issue and how it can be taken forward by a new government.

• Report

What health and care need from the next government: #4 – improving access to treatment

Nuffield Trust -
The fourth briefing in this series looks at waiting times for health care – the biggest cause for public dissatisfaction with the NHS and a central battleground of this election. It suggests seven tests that must be met which should be put to politicians as they battle to convince the public they have the answers.

• Briefing
• Nuffield Trust - press release

Accelerating transformation: how to develop effective NHS-industry partnerships

NHS Confederation -
This guidance aims to understand and unblock the barriers to making the potential of partnership a reality – exploring issues such as culture, trust and the challenge of stepping outside health system operational norms. It seeks to support the NHS and industry to develop, contract, implement, measure and deliver effective partnerships. It was jointly developed by the NHS Confederation and the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry. 

• Guidance
• NHS Confederation - publications

How likely is a general election to transform health and social care?

The King's Fund - 
Nicholas Timmins looks back at the last three big political transitions to ask - how fast might things change for health and social care?

• Long read
• The King's Fund - publications

How do the last five years measure up on levelling up?

Institute for Fiscal Studies -
Five years ago, then Prime Minister Boris Johnson made ‘levelling up’ a central plank of the Conservative Party’s bid for re-election, with a manifesto pledge to ‘level up every part of the UK’. In 2022, the government published a thorough and ambitious White Paper setting out 12 levelling up ‘missions’ to achieve by 2030, as well as specific metrics by which they would be measured. This report examines early progress towards those 12 missions, where possible using the headline metrics identified in the White Paper.

• Report
• Institute for Fiscal Studies - publications

How much funding does the NHS need over the next decade?

The Health Foundation -
This long read projects a potential £38bn shortfall in the funding needed to improve the NHS by the end of the next parliament. With the pledges made by both the main political parties so far falling a long way short of this, the analysis raises questions about the trade-offs facing the next government in balancing the funding needed by the NHS, pressures on other public services and levels of taxation.

• Long read
• The Health Foundation - news

Providers deliver: achieving value for money

NHS Providers -
This report shows how hospitals, mental health, community and ambulance services are finding new ways to provide better care and value for money. It says that the efforts of trusts must be matched by a commitment from government for capital investment to modernise buildings, equipment and technology in order to unlock greater productivity gains. It finds that barriers to progress on productivity include the impact of staff exhaustion and burnout, the disruptive impact of industrial action and the growing numbers of patients with complex conditions needing more resources or staff time to care for them.

• Report
• NHS Providers - news

Productivity in the NHS and health care sector

The King's Fund -
Productivity is one way people measure the performance of a sector – it compares the growth in the quantity of outputs to the growth in the quantity of inputs. This explainer looks at what productivity is and how different bodies measure health care productivity in England in different ways.

• The King's Fund - publications