Options appraisal on the measurement of people’s experiences of integrated care

People who use the NHS and social care want services that are coordinated and centred around their needs. This should include, for example, smooth transitions between services and effective communication between professionals1 2. Consequently, the Health and Social Care Act (2012) places a duty on providers and commissioners to deliver ‘integrated care’. The Department of Health has committed to developing ways of measuring whether care is integrated to support these policy ambitions

This report was commissioned by the Department of Health to assist them in developing ways of measuring people’s experiences of integrated care, and specifically to provide:
○ An options appraisal to assess the feasibility and cost of a number of strategies for measuring people's experience of integrated care.
○ Recommendations on data sources that could be used to produce measures suitable for inclusion in the NHS and Adult Social Care Outcomes Frameworks.

Note that the identification or development of specific indicators was not part of the remit of this project. The work was carried out between January and March 2013 by The King’s Fund, National Voices, the Nuffield Trust, and the Picker Institute. The options appraisal and recommendations are based on a series of consultations with stakeholders and analysis of selected literature and data sources.

The report is organised into four sections:
1. Defining integrated care and understanding the purpose of indicators.
2. Approaches to measuring integrated care.
3. Establishing potential data sources and evaluating their potential for deriving indicators.
4. Recommendations based on this evaluation.