Personal Health Budgets: the older person’s experience V1.0
Research type
Research Study
Full title
The experiences and perceived impact of personal health budgets for older people. A mixed methods study
IRAS ID
138742
Contact name
D O'Connor
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of York, Department of Health Sciences
Research summary
By April 2014 personal health budgets will be made available to all patients receiving NHS continuing healthcare funding, and to people with other long term conditions who may benefit. A personal health budget is an allocated pot of money which the patient is able to use in order to meet his/her identified health needs. A recent evaluation of the pilot programme revealed that personal health budgets can improve care-related quality of life and psychological well being of budget holders (Forder et al., 2012). The evaluation also made tentative suggestions regarding the impact on different patient groups, concentrating on diagnosis. Subsequent analysis found some evidence that older people did not see improvements in quality of life when compared to younger people. The evaluation does not explore this finding in any further detail. Literature in social care, where personal budgets have been available since 1997, also report that older people are a group of service users who are most likely to refuse a direct payment(Hatton & Waters, 2012, Fernandez et al., 2007, Leece & Leece, 2006), and least likely to see improvements in outcomes (Glendinning et al., 2008; Moran et al., 2013; Hatton and Waters, 2012). This study proposes to explore the experiences and perceived impact of personal health budgets for older people and their representatives. The study will use individual interviews with older budget holders (or their representative) and health professionals to understand the challenges and opportunities personal health budgets present, and to explore the perceived impact they have on health and well-being (Stage 1). The study will also develop and distribute a survey to explore the experiences and outcomes of a wider group of older people and consider some of the factors which may be associated with these outcomes (Stage 2). This application form is only concerned with Stage 1
REC name
North West - Preston Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
13/NW/0815
Date of REC Opinion
21 Nov 2013
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion