Hydration, UTIs and older people: learning from NHS pilots about how to improve care
Our evaluation of hydration-focused interventions for older people found promising signs of impact and highlighted the practical and systemic challenges of delivering and sustaining change.
“Champion, challenge, collaborate.”
Being commissioned by the Mayor of London to produce independent reviews of proposals for major service change, affecting Londoners, perfectly aligns with our commitment to help the health and care system make better decisions and ultimately achieve benefits for population health and wellbeing.
Why can’t I prove my programme is effective?
Evaluation blog series continues with Impact Evaluation Lead Mike Woodall looking at how programme designers can maximise the chances of success.
The merry-go-round of evaluation recommendations
A blog series and short reports sharing how to design projects to best support evaluation.
Leadership training and support for organisational development: an offer from the Strategy Unit
The Strategy Unit has long been known for the quality of its analytical work, and the clear, critical thi
Exploring the Edge of Tomorrow, Today
Exploring the critical building blocks for a resilient social care system in 2035 with the West Midlands Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (WM-ADASS).
The NHS as an anchor institution: addressing fuel poverty
The number of households in fuel poverty in Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent (SSoT) is higher than the national average. As anchor institutions, NHS organisations can use their assets to influence the health and wellbeing of their local communities. The Strategy Unit was asked by the Midlands NHS Greening Board to evaluate a cross-sector initiative in SSoT to help alleviate fuel poverty using savings generated through solar panels on NHS buildings. The project is called Keep Warm, Keep Well.
Evaluating and embedding social values in procurement at East London NHS Foundation Trust
This report presents emerging findings from the early development stages of a social value approach to procurement by East London NHS Foundation Trust (ELFT). These findings provide insights for other organisations beginning to explore how to use procurement to contribute to improving health and reducing health inequalities.
Urgent Community Response – What Works?
The Strategy Unit, with our partners Ipsos, has been commissioned by NHS England and NHS Improvement (NHSEI) to provide a long-term national evaluation of the Urgent Community Response programme rolled-out across England. The programme aims to shift resources to home and community-based services as part of the NHS commitment to providing the right care, to the right people, at the right time. And there are a range of outputs from the early work that provide learning for local systems as they develop their services.
‘Developing your ICS Intelligence Functions’: A Free Webinar Series
What is an ‘Intelligence Function’? What value can they add to decision making? How can they be configured and who needs to be involved? What lessons can be drawn from current practice?
Advancing the analytical capability of the NHS and its ICS partners
The Strategy Unit were asked by the Strategy and Development Team in the Directorate of the Chief Data and Analytics Officer, NHSE/I, to make recommendations for advancing analytical capability across the health and care workforce.
Inequities in children and young people’s mental health services
Good mental health during early years and childhood has a great bearing on health throughout life.
Some positive news for integrating GP practices with hospital trusts
The drive for greater integration of health and care services has been the central theme of UK health policy for most of
Learning from lockdown: support for people experiencing homelessness
There are few clearer measures of societal health than homelessness.
COVID-19: breaking the cycle of deprivation and ill health
Promoting whole-system action on the wider determinants of healthy life expectancy in the shadow of the COVID-19 pandemic
Socio-economic and environmental impact of Herefordshire and Worcestershire STP
Anchor institutions are large, typically non-profit, public sector organisations whose long-term sustaina
Modelling the impact of covid on waiting lists for planned care
Working with the national collaboration to coordinate covid-related analysis, and the NHSE/I Midlands region, the Strategy Unit has produced a ‘systems dynamics’ model of waiting lists for planned care. The model is freely available for non-commercial use across the NHS. Here, Steven Wyatt and Mike Woodall explain what we did and how we did it.
Outcomes based commissioning: A framework for local decision making
This local decision-making framework aims to empower systems as they look to design new contracting approaches aimed at improving outcomes.
Opening the ‘black box’ of scenario planning through realist synthesis
Scenario planning is recognised as an effective aid to strategic planning in complex, uncertain conditions. It is an approach that the Strategy Unit is increasingly building into its work with health and care systems and third sector organisations.