Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/288412 
Year of Publication: 
2020
Citation: 
[Journal:] The European Journal of Health Economics [ISSN:] 1618-7601 [Volume:] 21 [Issue:] 5 [Publisher:] Springer [Place:] Berlin, Heidelberg [Year:] 2020 [Pages:] 703-716
Publisher: 
Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Abstract: 
Objective: In April 2015, the English National Health Service started implementing the first waiting time targets in mental health care. This study aims to investigate the effect of the 14-day waiting time target for early intervention in psychosis (EIP) services after the first six months of its implementation. Study design We analyse a cohort of first-episode psychosis patients from the English administrative Mental Health and Learning Disabilities Dataset 2011 to 2015. We compare patients being treated by EIP services (treatment) with those receiving care from standard community mental health services (control). We combine non-parametric matching with a difference-in-difference approach to account for observed and unobserved group differences. We analyse the probability of waiting below target and look at different percentiles of the waiting time distribution. Results EIP patients had an 11.6–18.4 percentage point higher chance of waiting below target post-policy compared to standard care patients. However, post-policy trends at different percentiles of the waiting time distribution were not different between groups. Conclusions Mental health providers seem to respond to waiting time targets in a similar way as physical health providers. The increased proportion waiting below target did not, however, result in an overall improvement across the waiting time distribution.
Subjects: 
Waiting time targets
Mental health
Early intervention in psychosis
Difference-in-difference analysis
JEL: 
C31
D04
I11
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Creative Commons License: 
cc-by Logo
Document Type: 
Article
Document Version: 
Published Version

Files in This Item:
File
Size





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.