Personal Health Budget Holders and Family Carers - (POET 2015)

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In Control, Lancaster University and Think Local Act Personal have today published the findings of the third personal outcomes evaluation tool (POET) of over 500 personal health budget holders and carers.

The purpose of the survey is to provide insight into the experiences of personal health budget holders and their families, and the impact that having control over the budget has on their lives.

Findings can be used by NHS and local authorities to assess the effectiveness of their delivery methods and to set priorities for improving the process.

Altogether 302 personal health budget holders from 31 different areas across the country and 247 carers from 37 different areas completed the survey.

In the sample of POET survey respondents, the most common way to use their budget was on care and support services (59.6%), followed by personal assistants (48.3%), community and leisure services (26.8%) and equipment (25.2%).

Over 80% of personal health budget holders reported their budget having a positive impact on their quality of life, independence and arranging support. Over 60% reported their budget having a positive impact on their relationships with people paid to support them, as well as a positive impact on their friendships, physical and mental health.

Over three quarters of carers said that having a personal health budget had improved day to day stress, quality of life of the carer, quality of life of the person, choice and control the carer has in life.

People most commonly managed their personal health budget through direct payments (36.7%), followed by direct payments looked after by a friend or family member (26.2%), service provider managed personal health budgets accounted for (13.1%), council or NHS-managed personal health budgets (11.1%) and personal health budgets managed by a broker (11.5%) were less common.

Sam Bennett, Director of Think Local Act Personal said: "It is encouraging to see that people's experience of personal health budgets continues to be positive. The survey results are also useful in helping us to understand the conditions that lead to the best outcomes for people. This will be valuable learning to inform the rapid extension of personal health budgets in 2015-16 and beyond. While full scale rollout is still at a very early stage in the NHS, these results suggests a solid base to build upon in ensuring the benefits of personal health budgets can be experienced by many more people in the future."

John Waters, In Control said: "POET is intended as a service evaluation tool. While the sample size for the current survey is small, feedback from local authorities and NHS suggests that the annual report of findings are useful as a broad barometer of progress rather than validated research".

Isaac Samuels, National Co-production Advisory Group member and member of the TLAP Board said,

"POET survey has again acknowledged that from the perspective of personal health budget recipients good implementation leads to good outcomes such as improved quality of life, raised self-esteem and feelings of safety, independence and control. The tool is the best measure we have so far for professionals to take this on board and tailor their delivery methods accordingly".

 

Further information on personal health budgets

http://www.england.nhs.uk/healthbudgets/

Visit the people hub website, where people with a personal health budget and their families and carers can talk about their personal health budget experiences

http://www.peoplehub.org.uk/

More stories from personal health budget holders

http://www.nhs.uk/choiceintheNHS/Yourchoices/personal-health-budgets/Pages/about-personal-health-budgets.aspx