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Health literate discharge practices meet patient and family health literacy needs in preparation for care transitions from hospital to home. The purpose of this paper is to measure health literate discharge practices in Ontario hospitals using a new organizational survey questionnaire tool and to perform psychometric testing of this new survey.

This survey was administered to hospitals in Ontario, Canada. Exploratory factor analysis and reliability testing were performed.

The participation rate of hospitals was 46 percent. Exploratory factor analysis demonstrated that there were five factors. The survey, and each of the five factors, had moderate to high levels of reliability.

There is a need to expand the focus of further research to examine the experiences of patients and families. Repeating this study with a larger sample would facilitate further survey development.

Measuring health literate discharge practices with an organizational survey will help hospital managers to understand their performance and will help direct quality improvement efforts to improve patient care at hospital discharge and to decrease hospital readmission.

There has been little research into how patients are discharged from hospital. This study is the first to use an organizational survey tool to measure health literate discharge practices.

The performance construct may be one of the most elusive in organization theory. Health care organizations are particularly complex owing to their dual lines of accountability, i.e. professional and administrative. This article examines the factors affecting performance indicator development and use at the technical/managerial and institutional levels, including the accreditation process and the relationship between levels. Using institutional and rational/goal theory, the motivations behind performance measurement behavior at different organizational levels was explored. Results show that the institutional level is motivated by legitimacy while the technical/managerial level is motivated by rationality. Tensions exist between the two levels and between indicator development and use.

Large-scale change involves modifying not only the structures and functions of multiple organizations, but also the mindsets and behaviours of diverse stakeholders. This paper focuses on the latter: the informal, less visible, and often neglected psychological and social factors implicated in change efforts. The purpose of this paper is to differentiate between the concepts of organizational culture and mental models, to argue for the value of applying a shared mental models (SMM) framework to large-scale change, and to suggest directions for future research.

The authors provide an overview of SMM theory and use it to explore the dynamic relationship between culture and cognition. The contributions and limitations of the theory to change efforts are also discussed.

Culture and cognition are complementary perspectives, providing insight into two different levels of the change process. SMM theory draws attention to important questions that add value to existing perspectives on large-scale change. The authors outline these questions for future research and argue that research and practice in this domain may be best served by focusing less on the potentially narrow goal of “achieving consensus” and more on identifying, understanding, and managing cognitive convergences and divergences as part of broader research and change management programmes.

Drawing from both cultural and cognitive paradigms can provide researchers with a more complete picture of the processes by which coordinated action are achieved in complex change initiatives in the healthcare domain.

Presents a number of papers from the Performance Measurement Association conference held in July 2002. Reveals that all the papers investigate developments in the field of performance measurement and management since the Kaplan and Norton Balanced Scorecard was first introduced.

The launch of the £80m Preventative Technology Grant in 2006 has resulted in a considerable interest in telecare. Yet where in this emerging area should efforts be concentrated, and what lessons can be learnt from previous trials to aid future deployments? Based on practical experience and the work of the Housing & Telecare Learning & Improvement Networks at the Care Service Improvement Partnership (CSIP), Department of Health, this paper presents some of the common issues experienced and identified when implementing telecare. It makes a number of useful suggestions on how organisations working across housing, health and social care can make best use of telecare when planning, commissioning and delivering services.

THERE have been official links for the past twelve years between the Institute of Incorporated Work Study Technologists and Time and Motion Study. Many of its members have been valued contributors to our pages and the Institute has had editorial space for its news.

This special “Anbar Abstracts” issue of the International Journal of Public Sector Management is split into six sections covering abstracts under the following headings: Culture, Strategy and Organizational Structure; Leadership, Management Styles and Decision Making; Personnel and HR Management; Training and Development; Information Technology; Marketing and Customer Service Strategy.

The Food Hygiene (General) Regulations, 1970, when they first appeared, seem to have attracted more notice in the daily press than in the specialist journals, although, while re‐enacting much that was in the 1960 regulations, which they repeal, the new measures break new and important ground, as well as introducing a number of amending provisions, which experience has shown were needed. We tend to associate hygiene needs of food and drink with the thronging streets of the city and town, the hidden backrooms of restaurants, the bustling market and the mobile food van, which, in this motorized age, has ousted the bawling backstreet hucksterer.

The novel coronavirus and associated mitigation efforts have produced barriers to accessing services for adults with intellectual disabilities. This paper aims to evaluate the impact of Covid-19 on access to psychological services. The paper evaluates monthly referral rates and psychological distress scores for service users awaiting therapy.

A quantitative service evaluation was completed in a psychology service based in the North of England which specialises in supporting adults with intellectual disabilities. A single case experimental design was used to examine the impact of events in March 2020 on referral rates. Descriptive statistics and effect size calculations were used to examine the impact of prolonged waiting times on psychological distress scores.

Referral rates were examined comparing a 5-year rolling average monthly referral rate for the 12 months prior to March 2020 with the 12 months following. Findings demonstrate that events starting in March 2020 have had a considerable impact on referral rates and rates have not recovered. Eight service users were contacted to determine the impact of prolonged waiting times with results demonstrating increases in psychological distress of large effect size.

This is the only paper the authors are aware of examining the impact of the coronavirus on access to services and psychological distress for adults with intellectual disabilities. It is hoped that these findings will be able to inform both policy and practice as services continue to navigate the pandemic.