One year after the NHS Bill: the extra-contractual referral system and Henderson Hospital

Abstract
In 1991 we predicted the new contracting system introduced by the NHS Bill would reduce referrals to specialist units, particularly supra-regional units (Dolan & Norton, 1991), and that any resulting decline in patient numbers might lead to the suggestion that these resources were surplus to requirement and hence not viable in a market economy (Dolan & Norton, 1990).