| Abstract: | The White Paper ‘Working for patients’ (DoH 1989)1 and subsequent legislation, including the National Health Service and Community Care Act (1990), has facilitated the introduction of an internal market into the NHS. In particular, the establishment of provider hospitals as NHS trusts providing secondary care services, and the introduction of GP fundholders as purchasers of healthcare, has allowed the internal market to thrive, particularly where these two are in high concentration within a defined locality. One such area is southern Derbyshire. NHS trusts in this area face an unprecedented range of market factors, which threaten their long-term viability. These factors are described, as are the efforts of one trust to undertake detailed market planning. The rise of the GE/Mackinsey inatrix as a planning tool is advocated as an efective way of presenting relevant prodrict and market irtforiiiation to an NHS Trust Board, in an attempt to introduce strategic marketing planning at the highest level of the organisation. |
