Effectiveness and Cost-effectiveness of 'Usual Care' versus 'Specialist Integrated Care': A Comparative Study of Hospital Discharge Arrangements for Homeless People in England
Cornes M Forthcoming.

Purpose
To explore specialist services set up to improve homeless people’s experiences of leaving hospital. It is investigating different types of services; for example, some put patients in touch with a specially trained GP, others might employ a housing support worker to ensure people do not return to living on the streets after hospital discharge. We want to know what homeless people think of specialist services, how they help them tackle the range of problems they may have, and if this support prevents them returning to hospital. To compare effectiveness and costs we will also study hospital discharge arrangements where no specialist support for homeless people is in place.

Health at Home: A New Health and Wellbeing Model for Social Housing Tenants
Peabody Peabody Group, London. 2018

The report from Peabody is based on research with some of their general needs residents aged 50 and focuses on helping them to improve their understanding and confidence around managing their own health. It looked at how:

services can be delivered effectively at lower cost?
self-care can be encouraged for the most vulnerable customers and reduce dependency on direct support?
partnerships with other agencies can ensure a coordinated response to support residents’ complex and multiple health needs?

The report shows how housing associations can play an important role in empowering residents to stay healthy and also demonstrated the value of a person-centred approach to build more system resilient.

Making the Case for Investing in Actions to Prevent and/or Tackle Loneliness: A Systematic Review. A Briefing Paper
McDaid D, Bauer A, Park A Personal Social Services Research Unit, London. 2017

Summarises findings from a systematic review on the available economic evidence on the cost effectiveness of loneliness interventions for older people. The review found mixed evidence for the cost effectiveness of befriending interventions and the benefits of participation in social activities, ranging from cost saving to cost ineffective interventions. Recent evidence identified suggests that signposting and navigation services have the potential to be cost effective, with a saving of up to £3 of health costs for every £1 invested. The paper also makes suggestions for strengthening the evidence based on the cost effectiveness of interventions to address loneliness.

Mental Health of Adults in Contact with the Criminal Justice System [NG66]
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, London. 2017

This guideline covers assessing, diagnosing and managing mental health problems in adults (aged 18 and over) who are in contact with the criminal justice system. It aims to improve mental health and wellbeing in this population by establishing principles for assessment and management, and promoting more coordinated care planning and service organisation across the criminal justice system.

Also see NICE’s guideline on physical health of people in prison, which covers mental health assessment for the prison population as part of the first-stage health assessment for people going into prison, and continuity of mental health care for people leaving prison.

Recommendations
This guideline includes recommendations on:

assessing and managing a person’s mental health problems, including assessing risk to themselves and others
planning their care
psychological and pharmacological interventions
how services should be organised
staff training
Who is it for?
Commissioners and providers of health and justice services
All health and social care professionals working with adults in contact with the criminal justice system in community, primary care, secondary care and secure settings
Adults in contact with the criminal justice system who have or may have mental health problems

Related NICE guideline:
Appendix T: Health economic evidence – economic profiles Authors not listed

Money Matters: Reviews of Cost-effective Initiatives
Institute of Public Care The Institute for Research and Innovation in Social Services, Glasgow. 2011

This set of eight case studies, produced by the Institute of Public Care on behalf of IRISS (the Institute for Research and Innovation in Social Services), provides detailed analysis of the cost-effectiveness of a series of recent social care initiatives, ranging from nationwide and relatively high-profile schemes such as individual budgets to those thus far unique to one country, city or local authority area in the UK.

In each case, the report provides an overview of the initiative – its origins, including previous variants of the scheme, who it is intended to help, and how it works in practice – before justifying claims of cost-effectiveness by reference to detailed comparative costings, using one illustrative implementation of the scheme where the initiative is nationwide. Based on the analysis, the report sets out the initiative’s applicability to other settings as well as potential impediments to broader implementation.

The eight initiatives scrutinised are:

A study of Shared Lives schemes in south east England for providing care in the carer’s own home for individuals placed there by the local authority.
An extra-care housing scheme completed in Bradford.
Health in mind – social inclusion support for people with mental health needs in Bradford based round a series of mental health “well-being cafes”.
LinkAge Plus – analysis of nationwide DWP-funded pilot schemes for an holistic approach to provision of services for older people.
The Rapid Response Adaptations Programme – a Welsh initiative for providing adaptations such as ramps to let people return to their own homes.
A project in north west England to guide older people with low-level needs through a self-assessment process.
Analysis of various pilot sites taking different approaches to individual budgets, based on a broader evaluation conducted in 2008.
A project in two acute trusts in London to reconfigure hospital discharge procedures to emphasise rehabilitation.

Technical Guide: Building a Business Case for Prevention
Social Finance Social Finance, London. 2014

This guide sets out the issues that need to be considered when developing a business case to invest in preventive services and to ensure that any decision are based on robust and reliable data. The guide focuses on the following arguments: the importance of ‘investing to save’, arguing that prevention is cheaper in the long term; promotion of service innovation; placing the focus of commissioning on outcomes rather than outputs; and managing a shift in spending from acute to prevention to reduce demand over time. The guide outlines key four activities required to build a business case: understanding needs; understanding current costs; assessing possible interventions; and deciding how to measure the value and outcome of the interventions. It also provides a summary business case for prevention and using a Social Impact Bond (SBI) to finance a business case for prevention. An example case study of making a business case for prevention services in early years services in Greater Manchester is included.

What Works in Community Led Support?
Bown H, Carrier J, Hayden C National Development Team for Inclusion, Bath. 2017

This report has been written to share the findings, learning and examples of impact identified from working with 9 authorities across England, Wales and Scotland who are working differently to improve the lives and support of local people.

It is essentially an evaluation report on the authorities’ progress towards the outcomes and longer-term aims of community led support over the last 18 months, but we believe it is more than that.

We hope the learning shared here will help demonstrate what’s possible when applying core principles associated with asset based approaches at the same time as tackling hard systemic and cultural issues around speed of response, ease of access, changing the nature of ‘assessment’, reducing waiting times and lists, turning eligibility criteria on their heads and making the best use of local resources for people with a wide range of support needs.