Evaluating the Impact of the DH Grant to Thalidomiders
In March 2010, the English Department of Health confirmed its grant of £20 million to Thalidomiders to help them address the exceptional health and health-related needs they experience. The grant, which will be matched proportionately by the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland administrations, is to be distributed by The Thalidomide Trust over the next three years.
The Thalidomide Trust has asked Acton Shapiro to carry out this evaluation. We are already familiar with the work of the Trust, having previously evaluated the Trust’s HealthLink service. The evaluation of the health grant aims to:
- provide evidence of the impact of the grant on the health and well-being of individual Thalidomiders, and in particular how they have used the funding to meet health and support needs
- assess how the grant has (or may have) enabled individual Thalidomiders to reduce or avoid future health needs
- examine the effectiveness of working through a national organisation to meet the needs of other geographically dispersed groups with highly specialised needs (including providing evidence of the transferability of this model and describing the necessary conditions for wider implementation)
- provide evidence to support a decision by the Department of Health on whether to create a permanent scheme after the current three-year pilot has ended.
We are working with a group of 60 Thalidomide-impaired people across the UK to explore their experience in depth, as well as linking with wider work being carried out by the Thalidomide Trust National Advisory Committee on the costs of living with Thalidomide impairment.
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