PSSRU 2015 National Eligibility Criteria assessment survey

  • Research type

    Research Study

  • Full title

    PSSRU 2015 Study of the impact of national minimum eligibility criteria

  • IRAS ID

    171343

  • Contact name

    Jose-Luis Fernandez

  • Contact email

    J.Fernandez@lse.ac.uk

  • Sponsor organisation

    London School of Economics and Political Science

  • Duration of Study in the UK

    0 years, 6 months, 1 days

  • Research summary

    The Care Act will introduce national minimum eligibility criteria for adult care and support. All local authorities in England will have to meet this threshold from April 2015. The national eligibility criteria will replace the current system set out in Prioritising Need in the Context of Putting People First (2010), and previously in Fair Access to Care Services (FACS).

    Following the introduction of the new criteria, this study aims to test how the regulations have been implemented in practice, and to help researchers and policy-makers to understand the impact of changes to regulations both for individuals and for local authorities.

    All local authorities in England will be invited to participate in the study. Participating local authorities will be asked to select a sample of care managers stratified by client group involvement to respond to the survey. Selected care managers will be asked to provide details of eligibility decisions under the national eligibility criteria and likely eligibility under the old FACS criteria based on the ten most recent assessments of service users they have undertaken.

    Responses will be collected using a Microsoft Excel-based questionnaire which we will ask participants to submit by email.

    In addition, we will conduct focus groups in five of the participating authorities to collect qualitative feedback and identify any issues encountered by care managers in applying the eligibility regulations. The study is an important opportunity for council staff involved in providing assessments to provide feedback and highlight areas of uncertainty involving application of the new regulations.

  • REC name

    Social Care REC

  • REC reference

    15/IEC08/0022

  • Date of REC Opinion

    8 Apr 2015

  • REC opinion

    Favourable Opinion