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Abstract:
While resources for health remain limited, all managers must be able to demonstrate the cost-effectiveness of the services provided. Computer technology now provides the data with which to measure efficiency. Health visitors (together with other community-based professions) need to recognise the opportunities that information technology (IT) offers to help improve the planning and management of services. This article outlines the use of information to understand better the present delivery of health visitor services, to set objectives for the future and to measure actual performance against intended; in the near future to match better the supply of services to demand by developing neighbourhood or GP-practice profiles using mapping and graphics techniques; and in the longer term to refine measures of need or 'dependency' and 'outcome' to target resources and improve effectiveness.