Evidence based management

Evidence based medicine is a cornerstone of clinical practice. However, when it comes to management in the NHS, different rules apply.

The Department of Health recently commissioned a research study into patients' attitudes to choice: "patient choice" is the entire basis for the DoH's expensive and ill-judged folly called "Choose and Book". Unfortunately, the study didn't show what the DoH wanted; quite the contrary, it clearly indicated that patients by and large wanted GPs to make the difficult choices for them. In other words, they trusted the judgement of their GPs, so C and B wasn't really needed.

The research study was posted on the DoH website, but of course when they realized that doctors were not only reading it, but quoting it back to them, the posting was withdrawn, and the conclusions of the research disappeared into cyberspace.

A fuller version of the story appears in The Guardian, this is the link

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/publicservices/story/0,,1980852,00.html