What Personal Health Budgets mean to mental health service users
By William Smith
It is hard to keep up with all the proposed changes to our NHS system. The piloting of personal budgets in the NHS began in 2009. This scheme begun under the old Labour government and is now supported by the coalition in their health white paper ‘Equity and excellence: liberating the NHS’.
A recently published report shows that mental health service users in England are sceptical that these ‘personal budgets’ will improve their care. Many do not know what personal budgets are or how they would fit into similar funding schemes within the social care system.
To clarify what personal health budgets mean to us all I have lifted information directly from the pages of www.personalhealthbudgets.dh.gov.uk
NHS Confederation interviews with mental health service users about personal health budgets
An NHS Confederation Mental Health Network report just published discusses views on personal health budgets by people accessing mental health services, and their carers, outside of the Department of Health's pilot programme.
The Network supports the introduction of personal health budgets and the report, based on focus group and survey evidence, says many service users recognise they could provide a solution to the frustrations they have in getting more control over their care.
The report also suggests though that only a minority of people would want a personal health budget. It does caveat that the views discussed were given in a context where the participants had limited awareness of personal health budgets and little information about the provisions and processes involved.
The Confederation report positively concludes that "even a small proportion of patients acting as customers of their health services could have a profound effect across the system".
The experience of our NHS pilot sites so far is that most people who have been offered a personal health budget have agreed to try one. Parliamentary under-Secretary of State for quality Earl Howe said:
"In modernising the NHS we want to concentrate on what is most important to people and their families - better quality care and improved health outcomes. Personal health budgets are one way that people can work with the NHS to design healthcare that works better for them.
Personal health budgets are still very new to the NHS, and there are challenges to overcome. The independent evaluation of the pilot, to be published in October 2012, will give us the information we need to inform the rollout of personal health budgets in the longer term."
About personal health budgets
The report Personal health budgets: the views of service users and carers is based on interviews with 60 people who participated in focus groups and 100 people who responded to a survey. It is the third in a series looking into the implementation of personal budgets.A pilot programme involving around half the primary care trusts in England is currently underway to test out personal health budgets in the NHS. The programme and its evaluation will explore who will benefit most from personal health budgets, and how the NHS can make them work.
This is a very different way of managing health care, and we know there are many details to work through. That is why we are piloting personal health budgets, and evaluating the work that the pilot sites will do.
The pilot programme will run for three years, until 2012.
This clears up what personal budgets could mean to us but let’s hope it’s not just another good idea which is badly implemented. ‘
