Health and care systems in Europe are facing core common challenges, which require harmonised and coordinated solutions. The European Partnership on Transforming Health and Care Systems (THCS) represents a unique strategic opportunity to bring together stakeholders, create synergies, coordinate Research and Innovation actions, facilitate the digitization of health and care services and support the transformation of health and care systems with innovative solutions driven by knowledge and evidence. The general objective of THCS is to contribute to the transition towards more sustainable, efficient, resilient, inclusive, innovative and high-quality people centred health and care systems equally accessible to all people. For this purpose, THCS aims not only to create new knowledge and scientific evidence but to co-design new solutions and support their transfer and scale-up across countries and regions while also fostering capacity building. The approach for a successful and smooth implementation of THCS will focus on three main work streams: 1) Filling the knowledge gaps with research actions aiming at providing the necessary evidence, 2) Implementation and transfer aiming at supporting actions focusing on the testing of existing solutions and adaptability in different national and regional contexts, and 3) Boosting health and care systems through dedicated activities (capacity building and trainings, study visits, technical assistance, twinning, networking) involving different health and care stakeholders. To address these three work streams, THCS is built around four pillars that group different types of activities addressing different types of stakeholders of the health and care system. The activities are organised in ten Work Packages working closely together to achieve the objectives of the Partnership and clustered in the four Pillars.

ADR UK (Administrative Data Research UK) is a partnership transforming the way researchers access the UK’s wealth of public sector data, to enable better informed policy decisions that improve people’s lives. By linking together data held by different parts of government, and by facilitating safe and secure access for accredited researchers to these newly joined-up data sets, ADR UK is creating a sustainable body of knowledge about how our society and economy function – tailored to give decision makers the answers they need to solve important policy questions. ADR UK is made up of three national partnerships (ADR Scotland, ADR Wales, and ADR NI) and the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which ensures data provided by UK government bodies is accessed by researchers in a safe and secure form with minimal risk to data holders or the public. The partnership is coordinated by a UK-wide Strategic Hub, which also promotes the benefits of administrative data research to the public and the wider research community, engages with UK government to secure access to data, and manages a dedicated research budget. ADR UK is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), part of UK Research and Innovation. To find out more, visit adruk.org or follow @ADR_UK on Twitter. Scottish Government receives funding as part of ADR Scotland (Administrative Data Research Scotland), a partnership combining specialists in the Scottish Government’s Data Sharing and Linkage Unit with the expertise of academic researchers at the Scottish Centre for Administrative Data Research. Together they are transforming how public sector data in Scotland is curated, accessed and explored, so it can deliver its full potential for policymakers and for the public. ADR Scotland is linking administrative data sets and conducting research on a suite of critical issues in Scotland, from health and social care to lifelong wellbeing, and from poverty and fair work to building safer communities. The Scottish Government team brings proven experience in managing data-sharing and linkage projects, access to and understanding of policymakers in government, expertise in information governance and the application of the Digital Economy Act. It is committed to taking forward a programme of work to develop a new infrastructure to support administrative data research.

ADR UK (Administrative Data Research UK) is a partnership transforming the way researchers access the UK’s wealth of public sector data, to enable better informed policy decisions that improve people’s lives. By linking together data held by different parts of government, and by facilitating safe and secure access for accredited researchers to these newly joined-up data sets, ADR UK is creating a sustainable body of knowledge about how our society and economy function – tailored to give decision makers the answers they need to solve important policy questions. ADR UK is made up of three national partnerships (ADR Scotland, ADR Wales, and ADR NI) and the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which ensures data provided by UK government bodies is accessed by researchers in a safe and secure form with minimal risk to data holders or the public. The partnership is coordinated by a UK-wide Strategic Hub, which also promotes the benefits of administrative data research to the public and the wider research community, engages with UK government to secure access to data, and manages a dedicated research budget. ADR UK is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), part of UK Research and Innovation. To find out more, visit adruk.org or follow @ADR_UK on Twitter. Scottish Government receives funding as part of ADR Scotland (Administrative Data Research Scotland), a partnership combining specialists in the Scottish Government’s Data Sharing and Linkage Unit with the expertise of academic researchers at the Scottish Centre for Administrative Data Research. Together they are transforming how public sector data in Scotland is curated, accessed and explored, so it can deliver its full potential for policymakers and for the public. ADR Scotland is linking administrative data sets and conducting research on a suite of critical issues in Scotland, from health and social care to lifelong wellbeing, and from poverty and fair work to building safer communities. The Scottish Government team brings proven experience in managing data-sharing and linkage projects, access to and understanding of policymakers in government, expertise in information governance and the application of the Digital Economy Act. It is committed to taking forward a programme of work to develop a new infrastructure to support administrative data research.

ADR UK (Administrative Data Research UK) is a partnership transforming the way researchers access the UK’s wealth of public sector data, to enable better informed policy decisions that improve people’s lives. By linking together data held by different parts of government, and by facilitating safe and secure access for accredited researchers to these newly joined-up data sets, ADR UK is creating a sustainable body of knowledge about how our society and economy function – tailored to give decision makers the answers they need to solve important policy questions. ADR UK is made up of three national partnerships (ADR Scotland, ADR Wales, and ADR NI) and the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which ensures data provided by UK government bodies is accessed by researchers in a safe and secure form with minimal risk to data holders or the public. The partnership is coordinated by a UK-wide Strategic Hub, which also promotes the benefits of administrative data research to the public and the wider research community, engages with UK government to secure access to data, and manages a dedicated research budget. ADR UK is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), part of UK Research and Innovation. To find out more, visit adruk.org or follow @ADR_UK on Twitter. ADR Scotland is working to bring together a range of data on children. This will include: pupil census data for Scotland, Scottish Government data on looked after children, children’s health, births and deaths, the 2001/2011 national census, attendance, absence and exclusion from school, child protection, secure care for children, exam qualifications, school leaver destinations, and child wellbeing. The project aims to provide information about the data and enable access with the potential for it to be linked together.

In 2013, the UK began a major reform to disability benefits affecting more than 1 in 20 people in the country. This reform replaced Disability Living Allowance (DLA) with Personal Independence Payments (PIP). Like DLA, PIP is a benefit meant to help with costs associated with severe health conditions or disability. However, PIP is more stringent in terms of assessment and subsequent re-assessment of eligibility. The effect of this greater stringency on physical and mental health, owing to increased stress and anxiety within a vulnerable population, is unknown. We will estimate the impact on mortality and on mental health, across different types of claimants and we will explore the mechanisms that drive this. Our project will provide credible quantitative evidence on this spillover from economic policy to population health that could improve decision-making by policy makers. The challenge addressed: what and how? A simple comparison of people claiming PIP and people claiming DLA would not reveal the causal effect of greater stringency on health and mental health. This is because there are underlying differences between the types of people who claim each benefit. Similarly, a before and after comparison of people moving from DLA to PIP would not reveal the causal effect, because there have been other determinants of physical and mental health that have changed over time since 2013. However, it is causal effects that we need to estimate in order to evaluate this reform and to provide an evidence base for future reforms. From October 2015, most existing DLA claimants with indefinite awards and without changes in circumstances were contacted by the DWP and instructed to apply for PIP. However, those recipients born before 8th April 1948 were exempted from the requirement to apply for PIP and could continue claiming DLA indefinitely. This decision generates a sharp jump in the likelihood of moving from DLA to PIP between people with very similar dates of birth who should otherwise be similar to each other. Our project will use this policy-induced jump in a Regression Discontinuity Design (RDD), a credible and widely used technique in applied econometrics, to identify the causal effect of the reform. Aims and objectives It has now been 10 years since the transition from DLA to PIP began, but this potentially impactful reform has yet to be rigorously quantitatively evaluated. Beyond providing the first attempt to do this, we will advance understanding of the determinants of mental health in this vulnerable population. We will uncover the impact that economic insecurity has on health outcomes. The findings of our project will form the basis of at least three peer-reviewed journal articles that will be widely disseminated to academic and non-academic audiences, international conference presentations, policy briefs and blogs. Potential applications and benefits Disability benefit reform is a contentious issue and an active area of policy debate within the UK and internationally. Current reforms to disability benefit in Scotland, for example, are a partial unwinding of the reform that we are studying in this project. Our results can inform likely effects of such a policy among the elderly. In addition, evidence on the impact of economic insecurity on mental health, more generally, is of interest because of policy debates in the NHS regarding waiting times, health inequalities and the challenges associated with an ageing population.