Commissioning community stroke teams
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Understanding strategic decision making processes in community stroke services commissioning
IRAS ID
165321
Contact name
Rebecca O'Connor
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Nottingham
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 0 months, 0 days
Research summary
Commissioning is an important part of today’s NHS as it is the process by which the healthcare needs of the population are assessed to determine that the right services are designed, purchased and delivered. It was introduced to help improve the way healthcare is organised, and to improve the quality of healthcare while reducing how much it costs. However, commissioning has been criticised for not having made a great impact on NHS quality and spending. In recent years, commissioners have been encouraged to look at community services as a way of reducing the burden on hospitals, so that patients can have the treatment they need at home rather than being in an expensive hospital bed. Patients in hospital are usually treated by a medical team who have specialist knowledge of their condition, whereas traditionally care in the community has been managed by General Practitioners and nurses who have more generalist skills. With a condition like stroke, its not clear if patients would receive better care and outcomes if they received non-emergency care at home from general community healthcare teams or a team with stroke specific skills. This means that commissioners have to make difficult decisions about the type of community services they design and buy for their stroke population.
This study is interested in understanding how the people that are involved in commissioning work together to make these difficult decisions and if these relationships are affecting how healthcare services are designed and delivered. We would like to know who is influencing the decisions, and how and why they do this. This study will examine two case studies of how stroke commissioning is happening in the real world so that we have a better understanding of how commissioning is working and start to work on ways of improving it in the future.
REC name
Wales REC 6
REC reference
15/WA/0008
Date of REC Opinion
9 Jan 2015
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion