Assessment-based study of the impact of new social care regulations
Research type
Research Study
Full title
A study of the impact of new adult social care eligibility regulations on recently-assessed cases
IRAS ID
158945
Contact name
Jose-Luis Fernandez
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
London School of Economics and Political Science
Research summary
The Care Bill will introduce national minimum eligibility criteria for adult care and support. All local authorities in England will have to meet this threshold from April 2015. The national eligibility criteria will replace the current system set out in Prioritising Need in the Context of Putting People First (2010), and previously in Fair Access to Care Services (FACS).
This study aims to test how the draft regulations work in practice, and to help researchers and policy-makers to understand the equivalence to current levels of provision and the likely impact for individual clients and for local authorities.
The study will invite participation from 15 to 20 local councils. Participating local authorities will be asked to select a sample of care managers stratified by client group involvement to respond to the survey. Selected care managers will be asked to assess the draft eligibility criteria and apply them to the last ten to fifteen assessments of service users they have undertaken. Responses will be collected using a Microsoft Excelbased questionnaire which we will ask participants to submit by email.
In addition, we will conduct focus groups in five of the participating authorities to test the wording of the draft criteria and identify any issues encountered by care managers in applying the proposed guidelines. The study is an important opportunity for council staff involved in providing assessments to provide feedback and contribute to the development of the national eligibility criteria.
REC name
Social Care REC
REC reference
14/IEC08/1005
Date of REC Opinion
24 Jun 2014
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion