Early experiences of implementing personal health budgets.

The aim of this report is identify the challenges faced by project teams in implementing budgets and also any strategies and approaches that worked well. One of the overall aims of the evaluation is to provide lessons for successful implementation of personal health budgets in other areas should the policy be taken forward. This report provides early analysis in this regard.

Over the period April to June 2010, interviews were conducted with personal health budget project leads in the 20 in‐depth sites. The interviews were semi‐structured, allowing project leads to discuss their implementation processes and other relevant issues. Each interview lasted approximately 1.5 hours. Interviews were transcribed and coded in accordance with the areas covered in the topic guide.