“Getting in touch with the Joneses”: a strategy for monitoring a community based service for people with mental handicaps

In order to provide services which will enhance the image of service users and promote opportunities for them to develop, it is necessary to evaluate what is provided in relation to these high aims. This paper describes the attempts of some people in Bath District Health Authority to create a monitoring process for doing this. The previous article in this series (Abbott, Howell, and James, 1990) outlined the many issues involved in this process. This article describes in detail the method which evolved. The benefits and limitations of the approach are discussed.