Authors' recommendations: In this preliminary report we have attempted to map synthesised and quality assessed research evidence on specialist nursing services from several sources. We identified seven potentially relevant systematic reviews of effectiveness, covering diabetes, epilepsy, breast care nurses, heart failure clinics, inflammatory bowel disease, multiple sclerosis and bronchiectasis. The reviews varied widely in the way they approached the topic and in their inclusion criteria. In very general terms, the reviews found limited evidence for the superior effectiveness of specialist nurses over standard care or other comparator. However, this should not be interpreted as evidence of ineffectiveness. The review findings may simply reflect the difficulty of assembling a strong evidence base in this field, particularly in view of the complexity of the interventions under evaluation. We identified twelve potentially relevant economic evaluations in the NHS EED database. In contrast to the systematic reviews (syntheses of several studies), the economic evaluations (single studies) often found positive results. The relevance of the economic evaluations to York Hospitals NHS Trust depends on how similar the services under evaluation (including 'usual care') are to those at York as well as the methodological rigour of the study. Interpretation and evaluation of the evidence requires further contextual information about the Trust's current services, in particular to assess generalisabilty of research evidence to the York setting. We would be happy to work with the Trust to identify areas for more detailed examination.

Project Status: Completed

Year Published: 2011

URL for published report: http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/crd/pdf/Specialist%20nurses%20evidence%20briefing.pdf

English language abstract: An English language summary is available

Publication Type: Not Assigned

Country: England

Organisation Name: University of York

Contact Address: University of York, York, Y01 5DD, United Kingdom. Tel: +44 1904 321040, Fax: +44 1904 321041,

Contact Name: crd@york.ac.uk

Contact Email: crd@york.ac.uk

Copyright: University of York