The Realising the Value programme has developed an economic modelling tool to help commissioners evaluate the potential impact of investing in person- and community-centred approaches.

Key findings

• The tool consists of an Excel spreadsheet, a user guide which explains how to use the tool and a summary report which sets out the context and some of the key findings that the model has generated.
• The economic modelling undertaken by the Realising the Value programme and detailed in the summary report suggests that implementing person- and community-centred approaches at scale has the potential to contribute to efforts to slow the demand pressures on the system and may yield efficiency savings.
• The summary report also suggests how the evidence base can be enhanced in the future, in order to produce more robust modelling and local business cases.

The Realising the Value economic modelling tool allows commissioners to assess the potential impact of commissioning person- and community-centred approaches in their local area. It aims to help people who want to commission these approaches build the business case for doing so.

The tool has been developed in close collaboration with local sites, commissioners and experts in economic modelling and person- and community-centred approaches. It draws on high-quality research evidence as well as data collected from the five Realising the Value local partner sites across the country. These sites are all mature practitioners in the area of person- and community-centred approaches.

In the three links below you will find:

• The summary report: gives a full introduction to the tool and sets out some findings from the model.
• The user guide: gives a brief introduction to the tool and explains how commissioners can use it, using worked examples.
• The economic modelling tool: enables the exploration of different scenarios for commissioning person- and community-centred approaches for health and wellbeing.

Other relevant resources: a collaboration including SIMUL8, Datalytics, a small group of CCGs, and NHS England has developed a tool to help organisations understand the financial and/or activity implications for new models of care for people with long-term conditions across different cohorts of patients and settings. The model is similar to the Realising the Value economic modelling tool as it uses some pre-populated data for areas and can be used to support the development of business cases. It uses simulation and requires users to enter assumptions about the impact of desired approaches. It can therefore can be used to model a wide range of person-centred care interventions. The model can be accessed for free by registering here.

Author: PPL