Abstract In 2002 the Irish Government announced the establishment of the National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF) as a means of addressing patients’ long wait times for public hospital treatment. A new health strategy published in December 2001 promised that ‘by the end of 2004 all public patients will be scheduled to commence treatment within a maximum of three months of referral from an outpatient department’. Qualitative methods, including documentary analysis and key informant interviews, were used to gain an understanding of this policy process. The findings were then analysed through the framework proposed for this special issue where ideas, institutions and politics interact. Using McConnell’s typology of policy failure, this research finds the NTPF to be an example of a policy failure because, even though tens of thousands of public patients have been treated under the NTPF, waiting times and numbers have persisted and escalated since the NTPF was established.

中文翻译：

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国民治疗购买基金——对一些患者来说是成功的，但公共政策却是失败的？

摘要 2002 年，爱尔兰政府宣布设立国民治疗购买基金（NTPF），以解决患者等待公立医院治疗时间过长的问题。2001 年 12 月公布的一项新的健康战略承诺，“到 2004 年底，所有公立病人都将被安排在从门诊部转诊后最多三个月内开始治疗”。定性方法，包括文件分析和关键知情人访谈，被用来了解这一政策过程。然后通过为这个思想、机构和政治相互作用的特刊提出的框架分析了调查结果。使用麦康奈尔的政策失败类型学，这项研究发现 NTPF 是政策失败的一个例子，因为，