'The questions are no longer whether to use or make an evaluation, but how well we use one or carry one out.' 'As both volume and skills in healthcare increase, there is a parallel increase in the need to evaluate the outcomes and the effects of services rendered. In this book John Ovretveit furnishes us with timely, thoughtful and thorough guidelines for evaluation methods applied to health services.' - Gudmund Hernes, Minister of Health, Norway. A basic textbook which describes the range of approaches to evaluation in healthcare and policymaking, and challenges some of the assumptions of the evidence based healthcare movement. For health practitioners, managers and policy advisers who need to use or carry out an evaluation, but who may be confused by the variety of approaches and about what we mean by 'evidence'. The book is also useful to researchers who need to know about the strengths and weaknesses of different types of evaluation and about the practice and politics of evaluation. It describes principles, concepts and methods for evaluating health treatments, services, policies and organizational interventions. The strength of this book is its even-handed and accessible overview of the many different evaluation perspectives and methods used in the health sector. Its practical and multidisciplinary approach shows how to ensure that evaluation results in action. The author draws on his eighteen years experience as an evaluator and gives frameworks and examples which have been tried and tested in workshops, teaching and distance learning materials which explain the complexities of evaluation. The reader will find this an invaluable introduction and reference book for understanding the increasingly important role which evaluation is playing in everyday clinical, managerial and policymaking work. Winner of the 1998 European Health Management Association distinguished publication award.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Before new interventions are released into disease control programmes, it is essential that they are carefully evaluated in field trials'. These may be complex and expensive undertakings, requiring the follow-up of hundreds, or thousands, of individuals, often for long periods. Descriptions of the detailed procedures and methods used in the trials that have been conducted have rarely been published. A consequence of this, individuals planning such trials have few guidelines available and little access to knowledge accumulated previously, other than their own. In this manual, practical issues in trial design and conduct are discussed fully and in sufficient detail, that Field Trials of Health Interventions may be used as a toolbox' by field investigators. It has been compiled by an international group of over 30 authors with direct experience in the design, conduct, and analysis of field trials in low and middle income countries and is based on their accumulated knowledge and experience. Available as an open access book via Oxford Medicine Online, this new edition is a comprehensive revision, incorporating the new developments that have taken place in recent years with respect to trials, including seven new chapters on subjects ranging from trial governance, and preliminary studies to pilot testing.

An introduction to evaluation of health treatments, services, policies and organizational interventions.

Whether you are evaluating the effectiveness of a drug, a medical device, a behavioral intervention, a community mobilization, or even a new law, this is the book for you. Written in plain language, it simplifies the process of designing interventions, analyzing the data, and publishing the results. Because the choice of research design depends on the nature of the intervention, the book covers randomized and nonrandomized designs, prospective and retrospective studies, planned clinical trials and observational studies. In addition to reviewing standard statistical analysis, the book has easy-to-follow explanations of cutting edge techniques for evaluating interventions, including propensity score analysis, instrumental variable analysis, interrupted time series analysis and sensitivity analysis. All techniques are illustrated with up-to-date examples from medical and public health literature. This will be essential reading for a wide range of healthcare professionals involved in research as well as those more specifically interested in public health issues and epidemiology.

Health and human services currently face a series of challenges – such as aging populations, chronic diseases and new endemics – that require highly complex responses, and take place in multiple care environments including acute medicine, chronic care facilities and the community. Accordingly, most modern health care interventions are now seen as ‘complex interventions’ – activities that contain a number of component parts with the potential for interactions between them which, when applied to the intended target population, produce a range of possible and variable outcomes. This in turn requires methodological developments that also take into account changing values and attitudes related to the situation of patients’ receiving health care. The first book to place complex interventions within a coherent system of research enquiry, this work is designed to help researchers understand the research processes involved at each stage of developing, testing, evaluating and implementing complex interventions, and assist them to integrate methodological activities to produce secure, evidence-based health care interventions. It begins with conceptual chapters which set out the complex interventions framework, discuss the interrelation between knowledge development and evidence, and explore how mixed methods research contributes to improved health. Structured around the influential UK Medical Research Council guidance for use of complex interventions, four sections, each comprised of bite-sized chapters written by multidisciplinary experts in the area, focus on: - Developing complex interventions - Assessing the feasibility of complex interventions and piloting them - Evaluating complex interventions - Implementing complex interventions. Accessible to students and researchers grappling with complex interventions, each substantive chapter includes an introduction, bulleted learning objectives, clinical examples, a summary and further reading. The perspectives of various stakeholders, including patients, families and professionals, are discussed throughout as are the economic and ethical implications of methods. A vital companion for health research, this book is suitable for readers from multidisciplinary disciplines such as medical, nursing, public health, health services research, human services and allied healthcare backgrounds.

Process evaluation is an essential component of any program evaluation or intervention research effort. This important resource offers an overview of the history, purpose, strengths, and limitations of process evaluation and includes illustrative case material of the current state of the art in process evaluation. Process Evaluation for Public Health Interventions and Research fills an important gap in the literature for public health researchers, practitioners, scholars, trainers, and students.

The second edition of the Impact Evaluation in Practice handbook is a comprehensive and accessible introduction to impact evaluation for policy makers and development practitioners. First published in 2011, it has been used widely across the development and academic communities. The book incorporates real-world examples to present practical guidelines for designing and implementing impact evaluations. Readers will gain an understanding of impact evaluations and the best ways to use them to design evidence-based policies and programs. The updated version covers the newest techniques for evaluating programs and includes state-of-the-art implementation advice, as well as an expanded set of examples and case studies that draw on recent development challenges. It also includes new material on research ethics and partnerships to conduct impact evaluation. The handbook is divided into four sections: Part One discusses what to evaluate and why; Part Two presents the main impact evaluation methods; Part Three addresses how to manage impact evaluations; Part Four reviews impact evaluation sampling and data collection. Case studies illustrate different applications of impact evaluations. The book links to complementary instructional material available online, including an applied case as well as questions and answers. The updated second edition will be a valuable resource for the international development community, universities, and policy makers looking to build better evidence around what works in development.

Since its publication in 2008, Managing and Evaluating Healthcare Intervention Programs has become the premier textbook for actuaries and other healthcare professionals interested in the financial performance of healthcare interventions. The second edition updates the prior text with discussion of new programs and outcomes such as ACOs, Bundled Payments and Medication Management, together with new chapters that include Opportunity Analysis, Clinical Foundations, Measurement of Clinical Quality, and use of Propensity Matching.

Sixth edition of the hugely successful, internationally recognised textbook on global public health and epidemiology, with 3 volumes comprehensively covering the scope, methods, and practice of the discipline

Nursing and Health Interventions covers the conceptual, empirical, and practical knowledge required for engaging in intervention research. This revised edition provides step-by-step guidance on the complex process of intervention development and methods for developing, delivering, evaluating and implementing intervention, supported by a wealth of examples. The text describes each essential aspect of intervention research, from generating an intervention theory, to procedures for adopting evidence-based interventions in practice. This second edition provides up-to-date coverage of intervention research and its impact on improving standards of care. Throughout the text, readers are provided with the foundational knowledge required for generating evidence that informs treatment decisions in practice, and choosing the best approaches for designing, delivering, evaluating and implementing interventions. A valuable ‘one-stop’ resource for students, researchers, and health professionals alike, this book: Covers the importance and issues of evidence-based healthcare practice, the role of theory in research in the intervention design and evaluation, and evaluation of effectiveness and implementation of interventions in a single volume Reviews the decision-making steps and the knowledge needed to inform decisions in research and practice Discusses the limitations of evidence derived from randomized controlled trials (RCTs) Written by leading experts in the field, Nursing and Health Interventions remains an invaluable resource for nursing and healthcare students, researchers, and health practitioners wanting to understand and apply intervention to improve the quality of care.