Alcohol is an accepted part of our society but there is an increasing burden of harm from its misuse. Alcohol-related crime and disorder costs the tax payer over £7.3 billion per year, workplace costs add up to around £6.4 billion and costs to the NHS around £2.7 billion.1 The Government …
Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death in the UK and accounts for one third of all deaths in this country. It is estimated that 2.6 million people in the UK are living with cardiovascular disease.1 Smoking, obesity, poor diet and lack of physical exercise are major causes of …
The aim of improving the health of the poorest, fastest is to reduce health inequalities. This lies at the heart of the public health white paper Health Lives, Healthy People (PHWP).1 Health inequalities have been defined as “differences in health status or in the distribution of health determinants between different …
Social enterprises are at the heart of the coalition government’s Big Society agenda. Introduced by the previous Labour government, social enterprise organisations are seen to be more innovative and responsive than traditional NHS and other public service organisations. The Social Enterprise Pathfinder Programme was introduced in 2006 by the Labour …
This report, from the University of Bristol, discusses the evidence to support Self-Referral to Physiotherapy, a policy first introduced by the previous Labour government in its White Paper, ‘Our Health, Our Care, Our Say’. Self-referral aimed to enable patients to refer themselves directly to a physiotherapist without having to see …
The New Types of Worker Programme (NToW) was piloted under the previous Labour government. The initiative was part of a government agenda to further integrate health and social care services, by developing a workforce that had transferrable skills to work in both areas. The Department of Health funded a pilot …
Information Prescriptions were launched under the previous Labour government as a way to give patients or service users better information about their condition, treatment options and support networks. They aimed to give more support to people with long term needs, to tackle inequalities, improve access to services, provide choice and …
Individual Budgets (IBs) aimed to give social care users more choice and control over their own support arrangements, by giving them cash payments to spend so they can tailor their care to their personal needs and not just to what is offered. Individual Budgets were piloted by the previous Labour …
The previous Labour government developed the Care Closer to Home initiative in response to a need to move health and social care out of institutions such as hospital, and into community settings. The programme aimed to reduce demand on acute hospital services, whilst also improving patient choice and convenience. It …
The ‘Making the Most of Evaluation’ research group: Salisbury C, Stewart K, Purdy S, Thorp H, Cameron A, Lart R, Peckham S, Calnan M. The NHS White Paper ‘Our health, our care, our say’ (2006) described a new strategic direction for health and social care in the community.1 The …