Mergers and Acquisitions: The Nigerian Banking Consolidation Program

This paper examines the determinants of the exit behaviour of banks in the Nigerian consolidation program during July 2004 and December 2005. We conceptualise the exit process in a flexible bivariate competing risks model to examine the importance of macroeconomic and industry-specific factors for both merged banks and failed banks jointly. The preliminary results suggest that bank-specific characteristics mattered more for preventing bank failure than they did for emergence of the M&A banks. Second, the Central Bank of Nigeria’s assistance was highly influential in preventing bank failure, and, for banks that benefited, the assistance increased their probability of being merged or acquired. Also, we found no strong evidence suggesting that the prevailing macroeconomic conditions and industry-specific factors had influenced exit behaviour of banks during the consolidation exercise. We found evidence of structural dependence between failure and merger and acquisition hazards induced by CBN incentive

The Best of Both Worlds : An Example Mixed Methods Approach to Understand Men’s Preferences for the Treatment of Lower Urinary Tract Symptoms

Funded by Astellas Pharma Europe and Chief Scientist Office DI, SH, VW and MR are employed by the University of Aberdeen and performed the research. CM and JN are employees of Astellas Pharma EMEA, which funded the study in an unrestricted contract. All authors were involved in writing or reviewing the manuscript. Ethical approval was obtained from the College Ethics Research Board of the College of Life Science and Medicine, University of Aberdeen (CERB/2013/8/942). The Health Economics Research Unit (HERU) is supported by the Chief Scientist Office (CSO) at the Scottish Government Health and Social Care Directorate.Peer reviewedPostprin

Men’s preferences for the treatment of lower urinary tract symptoms associated with benign prostatic hyperplasia : a discrete choice experiment

HERU is supported by the Chief Scientist Office (CSO) at the Scottish Government Health and Social Care Directorate. Sebastian Heidenreich acknowledges financial support from the Institute of Applied Health Science, University of Aberdeen. Medical writing support was provided by Tyrone Daniel from Bioscript Medical, and was funded by Astellas Pharma Europe Ltd. Presented in part as a poster at the ISPOR 17th Annual European Congress, November 8–12, 2014, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. The poster’s abstract was published in Value in Health. 2014;17 (7):A472. Open Access JournalPeer reviewedPublisher PD

A managed clinical network for cardiac services: set-up, operation and impact on patient care

PURPOSE: To investigate the set up and operation of a Managed Clinical Network for cardiac services and assess its impact on patient care. METHODS: This single case study used process evaluation with observational before and after comparison of indicators of quality of care and costs. The study was conducted in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland and used a three-level framework. Process evaluation of the network set-up and operation through a documentary review of minutes; guidelines and protocols; transcripts of fourteen semi-structured interviews with health service personnel including senior managers, general practitioners, nurses, cardiologists and members of the public. Outcome evaluation of the impact of the network through interrupted time series analysis of clinical data of 202 patients aged less than 76 years admitted to hospital with a confirmed myocardial infarction one-year pre and one-year post, the establishment of the network. The main outcome measures were differences between indicators of quality of care targeted by network protocols. Economic evaluation of the transaction costs of the set-up and operation of the network and the resource costs of the clinical care of the 202 myocardial infarction patients from the time of hospital admission to 6 months post discharge through interrupted time series analysis. The outcome measure was different in National Health Service resource use. RESULTS: Despite early difficulties, the network was successful in bringing together clinicians, patients and managers to redesign services, exhibiting most features of good network management. The role of the energetic lead clinician was crucial, but the network took time to develop and ‘bed down’. Its primary “modus operand” was the development of a myocardial infarction pathway and associated protocols. Of sixteen clinical care indicators, two improved significantly following the launch of the network and nine showed improvements, which were not statistically significant. There was no difference in resource use. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS: The Managed Clinical Network made a difference to ways of working, particularly in breaching traditional boundaries and involving the public, and made modest changes in patient care. However, it required a two-year “set-up” period. Managed clinical networks are complex initiatives with an increasing profile in health care policy. This study suggests that they require energetic leadership and improvements are likely to be slow and incremental

Evaluation of the introduction of a pay for performance contract for UK family doctors using participant perceptions

In 2004 the UK government introduced a new ‘pay for performance’ element into the contract for family doctors (FDs). Its universal introduction with no pre-intervention data is not atypical of system-wide health reform but poses a considerable evaluation challenge. We derive estimates of its impact based on qualitative perceptions of the treatment effect reported by a sample of participants. We exploit variation in the firstyear achievements of those participants who thought quality had remained the same to generate pre-intervention estimates for those that perceived a change in quality. The average partnership of 4 FDs was paid £74,000 for achieving 982 of the 1,050 quality points available in the first year. Of these, we estimate the mean net gains attributable to the new contract to be less than 4 quality points. These gains were predominantly made on the clinical criteria and were larger for partnerships facing more competition for patients and with markers of higher quality prior to the introduction of the new contract.Family doctors, pay for performance, perceptional evaluation

Utilisation of eye-care services : The effect of Scotland's free eye examination policy

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