Report
Progress Report on the National Strategy to Reduce Gambling Harms
ABSG progress report 2020
Limited evidence from evaluations to guide decisions on treatment provision
Care pathways are still not well defined between different parts of the treatment system, for example between the NHS and GamCare and its partners, nor is there clear agreement on thresholds for onward referral, and which service offers what level of treatment and support and follow up. This is impeding progress on delivering the right treatment at the right time.
Leeds Beckett University was commissioned to evaluate the current GambleAware-funded treatment and support system. The first phase of this evaluation will focus on setting up and evaluation framework to assess the effectiveness of the treatment system and referral pathways. This will report in mid-April 2020, with the implementation of the systems evaluation against this framework then continuing until Summer 2021. A subsequent phase, looking at treatment outcomes at a provider level may not start until 2022.
The work being carried out by Leeds Beckett University is important and will provide useful evidence. The timeframes for this work, have been significantly delayed, which means the evidence the project hopes to produce will not be available until late in the current strategy period.
One implication of this is that decisions about the expansion of treatment will need to be made without this evidence from evaluation of existing services.
Last updated: 18 August 2021
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