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	In this update: integrated care HR systems neighbourhood justice online privacy carer's charter place based services performance evaluation health productivity decentralisation health performance technology assessment professional regulation nursing report card high cost health equipment emergency care audit health literacy ATSI workforce GP retirement women, health & aging chronic care health & environment food supply antibiotics & food primary mental health mental health transformation LBTI aged child abuse & public health sexual violence services sexual assault impacts climate change & children child poverty looked after children child protection staff support disability & employment disability access autism therapies low income & private rental housing instability & children neighbourhood working social housing rents homeless men Integrating health and social care: Where next? In the context of the intense financial and demographic challenges facing both health and social care, this paper offers a fresh assessment of the prospects for integrating health and social care and the opportunities and challenges arising from the UK government’s reform proposals. UK King's Fund (Mar 2011) Human Resource Information Management Systems - Risks and Controls The Better Practice Guide provides an overview of significant risks and controls that are relevant to key human resource (HR) functions, with particular focus within each chapter on managing risks through implementation of better practice principles. Aus Audit (Apr 2011) Problem-Solving Approaches to Justice audit examined whether the Neighbourhood Justice Centre (NJC) at Collingwood and the Court Integrated Services Program (CISP) at the Magistrates' Court's Melbourne, Sunshine and Latrobe Valley sites are reducing reoffending of participants and achieving client and community outcomes. Vic Audit (Apr 2011) The adequacy of protections for the privacy of Australians online the issues raised fall into two categories: those related to the adequacy of the existing privacy framework for protecting the privacy of Australians online; and challenges for law enforcement arising from technological advances. Aus Senate (Apr 2011) ACT Carers Charter Community Consultation Report A key message from participants in the workshops and through submissions is that the Charter must operate as one component in a broader strategy to achieve positive change for carers. The existence of the Charter does not in itself guarantee progress, although it is a useful first step. ACT DHCS (Apr (2011) Productive Places: continuing the focus on place-based improvement Sharing and integrating services across place ...The future workforce needs to be framed as including all those who are seeking to achieve social good, and includes: The nine-to-five day paid staff, volunteers, trainees and active citizens (associated with a range of organisations – public, private, community,social enterprise, mutual, etc)...While there will continue to be professional specialists, the point at which they need to get involved will be redefined, so that more responsibility will reside in the hands of generic workers who can call the professional to account. UK Local Government (Mar 2011) Performance Management and Evaluation: What’s the Difference? Performance management aims to ensure that social programs operate as intended. It requires ongoing, internal data collection and analysis, flexibility to ask a variety of questions, and the capacity to use experience and the literature to set program standards and benchmarks. Evaluation is intended to provide information to a broad set of stakeholders—funders, other practitioners, and policy makers—to advance knowledge in the field. It requires a clear set of research questions, the most rigorous design possible given programmatic constraints, and careful, time-consuming data analysis...Both are critical to operating successful social programs, but it is important to note that, while performance management is a necessary task for every operating social program, evaluation is not. US Childtrends (Jan 2011) Public Service Output, Inputs and Productivity: Healthcare The decline in Average Length Of Stay might be expected to have a positive impact on productivity, as it suggests that a greater number of procedures can be carried out using similar resources in any given period. However, this is not borne out by the evidence. A key reason may be that, while ALOS has been reduced by carrying out a greater number of quicker and more effective procedures, this change has only been achieved by employing similar proportionate increases in labour and procured goods and services. news release Spending on public healthcare and the output it generated both rose substantially between 1995 and 2009. Quality also rose but productivity fell slightly over the same period. UK National Statistics (Mar 2011) Decentralization in health care Many countries have decentralized, recentralized and then decentralized again in an ongoing cycle, searching the right balance of efficiency and responsiveness in their health care system. Looking at the arguments for and against, in many cases the same reasons are used to justify movement in opposite directions. European Observatory (Mar 2011) Performance Measurement for Health System Improvement: Experiences, Challenges and Prospects (2009) book now free to download European Observatory (Mar 2011) Incorporating Multiple Criteria in Health Technology Assessment : Methods and Processes Decision makers need to consider multiple criteria when considering what a health care system should pay for, or how much it should pay: health gain of course, but also the quality of patients’ experience of care, impacts on social equity and wider social considerations, and the quality of the evidence base. UK OHE (Apr 2011) Audit of health professional regulatory bodies initial decisions  looked for evidence of risks to public protection or public confidence in each regulator’s case-handling procedures and standards. UK CHRE (Mar 2011) Toward A National Report Card in Nursing: A Knowledge Synthesis identifies what is known about outcomes/performance monitoring initiatives in nursing, including specific indicators and reporting systems and what is known about the development, implementation and utilization of nursing report cards. Can NHSRU (Feb 2011) Managing high value capital equipment in the NHS in England Value for money is not being achieved across all trusts in the planning, procurement and use of ‘high value equipment’, such as CT, MRI scanners and Linear Accelerator Machines (linacs). ...Trusts are not collaborating to purchase machines and they are not getting the best prices. UK Audit (Mar 2011) Urgent and Emergency Care Clinical Audit Toolkit for all providers of urgent and emergency care, including clinicians and non-clinicians, out of hours doctors, emergency departments, walk-in centres, GP medical practices, pre-hospital emergency care doctors, NHS Pathways, NHS Direct, the Ambulance Service, and urgent care centres...The complex nature of the patient pathway for urgent care and the variety of different types of care workers with direct patient contact means that such services face particular challenges in ensuring continued monitoring of clinical standards for consistency and quality improvement. UK RCGP (mar 2011) Health Literacy Interventions and Outcomes: An Update of the Literacy and Health Outcomes Systematic Review of the Literature More than 75 million English-speaking adults in the United States have limited health literacy, making it difficult for them to understand and use basic health information...this is  Linked to Higher Risk of Death and More Emergency Room Visits and Hospitalizations US AHRQ (Mar 2011) Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Worker Project to identify how the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Worker (or ‘Health Worker’) workforce can be strengthened to deliver care in response to the known burden and distribution of disease in the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population. Health Workforce Aus (Apr 2011) Putting Away the Stethoscope for Good? Toward a New Perspective on Physician Retirement  One-third of Canadian physicians 65 and older are still working full time...Older family physicians more likely to narrow scope of practice than retire Can CIHI (Apr 2011) Women, health and ageing: Findings from the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health Aus Women's health Aus (Mar 2011) Co-Creating Health  programme helps people with long-term conditions to take control of their health and supports them to self-manage. UK health Foundation (mar 2011) Health and the environment: a compilation of evidence the World Health Organization (WHO) estimated that 24% of the global burden of disease was due to modifiable environmental factors. AIHW (Mar 2011) Victorian Food Supply Scenarios This report, from a VicHealth-funded study that created and projected three possible food supply scenarios to 2060, builds an evidence base for examining how cumulative changes in food systems can impact on the food that ends up on our tables VicHealth (Apr 2011) Tackling antibiotic resistance from a food safety perspective in Europe Antibiotics have revolutionized the treatment of infectious diseases. But their use and misuse have resulted in the development and spread of antibiotic resistance. This is now a significant health problem WHO Europe (Apr 2011) Building effective service linkages in primary mental health care: a narrative review part 2 Primary care services have not generally been effective in meeting mental health care needs. .. The objective of this study was to examine the factors that enable effective collaboration between specialist mental health services and primary mental health care. BMC Health Services research (Apr 2011) Transformation of a mental health system – the case of Scotland and its lessons for Australia Over the past ten years the mental health system in Scotland has gone from one characterised by outdated legislation, poor communication and a very limited policy framework to one which has been held out as exemplary Menzies Health (Feb 2011) Aging alone: Older lesbians, gays have higher rates of chronic disease, mental distress, isolation A lack of immediate family support may impact aging LGB adults' ability to confront statistically higher rates of diabetes, hypertension, poor mental health, physical disability and self-assessed fair or poor health, compared with demographically similar aging heterosexual adults.   US UCLA (Mar 2011) Public Health Leadership Initiative child maltreatment is a public health issue, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has developed a 3-year Public Health Leadership Initiative aimed at helping State public health agencies prevent child maltreatment. As part of this initiative, the CDC partnered with the Education Development Center to conduct an environmental scan of State public health agencies' involvement in child maltreatment prevention efforts. The purpose was to identify the work that agencies are conducting to enhance family resiliency, foster healthy child development, and prevent child maltreatment. US CDC (Mar 2011) Response to Sexual Violence Needs Assessments (RSVNA) Toolkit  commissioning and development of co-ordinated specialist services for victims of sexual violence UK Health (mar 2011) The impacts of sexual assault on women The effect of sexual assault is not only psychological or emotional but also impacts upon physical, social, interpersonal and financial domains AIFS (Apr 2011) Weathering the future: Climate change, children and young people, and decision making attempts to scope out the likely challenges, and the social, economic,health/wellbeing impacts posed by climate change on Australian children and young people. Aus ARACY (Apr 2011) A New Approach to Child Poverty: Tackling the Causes of Disadvantage and Transforming Families' Lives This is the UK Government’s first national Child Poverty Strategy, setting out a new approach to tackling poverty up to 2020. At its heart are strengthening families, encouraging responsibility, promoting work, guaranteeing fairness and providing support to the most vulnerable.  also  Opening Doors, Breaking Barriers focuses on inter-generational social mobility UK Education (Apr 2011) Looked-after Children: Further Government Response to the Third Report from the Children, Schools and Families Committee Building a care system founded on good relationships : Recommendations 31-34: Numbers in care We are convinced that for some children, in some circumstances, care should be seen as the best available option rather than a last resort. UK Parliament (Mar 2011) Supporting CPS Staff Following a Child Fatality or Other Critical Incidents As “first responders” to child abuse fatalities and other critical incidents, Child Protective Service workers should be supported with crisis debriefing services US APSAC (2011) Assembling the evidence jigsaw: insights from a systematic review of UK studies of individual-focused return to work initiatives for disabled and long-term ill people Since the mid-1990 s, UK governments have experimented with a range of active labour market policies aimed to move disabled people off benefits and into work to reduce the risk of poverty and social exclusion. This systematic review asks what employment impact have these interventions had and how might they work better? UK BMC (Mar 2011) Disability (Access to Premises - buildings) Standards 2010 (the Premises Standards) commence on 1 May 2011 Aus HRC (Mar 2011) Comparative Effectiveness of Therapies for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders Treatments Show Promise in Reducing Autism-related Behaviors, but Some Have Significant Side Effects more US resources on autism US AHRQ (Mar 2011) Bridging the divide: the experiences of low-income households excluded from the private rental sector in Australia project will focus on forced exits from private rental amidst increasing public concern about the impacts of shortages of appropriate, affordable private rental housing for lower-income households, and pressures in the social housing system to deliver appropriate, timely temporary and transitional housing to householders in need. AHURI (Apr 2011) Should I Stay or Should I Go? Exploring the Effects of Housing Instability and Mobility on Children, finds that low-income families move much more frequently than the general population.  While reasons for moving vary, the data and  interviews of low-income families show that moves resulting from unplanned or involuntary circumstances, such as an eviction or foreclosure, and moves that occur one after another as part of a pattern of frequent mobility tend to have negative impacts on child and family welfare, such as increased school absenteeism and a higher incidence of neighborhood problems. US HNF (Apr 2011) Working in neighbourhoods in Bradford describes progress, gaps and future opportunities in neighbourhood working in Bradford, following the development of devolved decision-making and neighbourhood working during the last 20 years. UK Joseph Rowntree (Apr 2011) A new policy for social housing rents proposes that each year the Welsh Assembly Government should propose a national target average rent for the following year.- There should be a table of percentages, derived from reliable data sources, that apply to the national average to create target rents across 9 dwelling types and sizes and the 22 local authorities. Wales (Mar 2011) How homeless men are faring: Some initial outcomes from the Michael Project Positive outcomes have been achieved by  participants in the three months since entry, especially by those men who accessed the project through the short and medium-term accommodation services. These short-term changes are important as they occurred while participants were likely to have had their most intensive interactions with the three integrated components of the Michael Project - accommodation, assertive case management and access to the eleven specialist providers. Mission Aus (Apr 2011)