The programme is funded until 2012 by the Department of Health and managed as part of its Policy Research Programme. It is coordinated on their behalf from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine by Professor Nicholas Mays, Department of Health Services Research and Policy, Faculty of Public Health and Policy, who also chairs the commissioning group.

The aim of the programme is to provide independent scientific evaluation of reform policies in order to inform effective implementation and subsequent development of
reform policies.

System reform policies include patient choice, 'payment by results', practice-based commissioning and diversity of providers. These policies are operating interactively and the goal of the evaluation programme is to capture the emergent processes and their interrelated effects.

The programme comprises three interlinked strands:

1. Literature reviews identifying and synthesising relevant research
2. Research on the implementation of system reform mechanisms
3. Evaluation of local health economies to assess the combined impact of the interaction of the four main reform mechanisms on local health system.

The programme is supported by an international expert advisory group.

It is planned that interim reports from individual projects and the programme as a whole will be published in early 2009 with final reporting after 2012.