Health and Health Services

Based on authors' experiences in working in the NHS and in teaching medical students, nurses, social science undergraduates and trainees in community medicine, Health and Health Services (originally published in 1984) is an introductory text on health care policies. Since its introduction in 1948, the National Health Service had frequently been the focus of intense scrutiny, debate, conflict and passion-and perhaps never more so than in the 1980s. Health and Health Services explores the issues underlying these reactions. Drawing upon the literature in social policy, economics, epidemiology, and community medicine, the book deals with major areas of debate in the provision of health care in post-war Britain. It takes as a central theme the relationship between health services and health, exploring the links between resource inputs, service outputs, and welfare outcomes. Within this framework, it is concerned with such issues as the allocation of resources to and within the National Health Service, the relationship between the public and private provision of health care, the efficiency and effectiveness of health services, the measurement of need, and the policy-making structures and processes of the NHS.

John R. Butler Michael S.B. Vaile

1. An organising framework: the health services system 2. Health, health services and politics 3. Some epidemiological trends in the United Kingdom 4. Spending on health services 5. Financing health services 6. The allocation of financial resources 7. The allocation of care 8. The structure of the National Health Service 9. The policy-making process 10. Thinking about outputs 11. The importance of measuring outputs: effectiveness, efficiency and need 12. The evaluation of health care 13. Quality control in health care