ArticleBMC health services research2026
The influence of policy narratives on evidence-informed decision-making in health policy - an analysis of Swedish healthcare policies from 1992 to 2024.
Article in BMC health services research, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundThere is a strong emphasis globally that health policy and practice can be improved by leveraging best available evidence in decision-making processes. The dynamic political context of policy means, however, that decision-making processes are highly complex. A growing field of inquiry examines how the evidence-informed approach impacts on and interacts with real-world policy development. Despite the growing recognition of the complexity of health policy development little is known about policy narratives underpinning evidence-informed decision-making. Analysis of policy narratives over time can reveal how recognition of policy problems and their corresponding solutions emerge and shift through a contestation of different ideas and interests and how they legitimise different political courses of action. The aim of this study is to explore policy narratives underpinning evidence-informed decision-making within Swedish healthcare, tracing their formulation and development from 1992 to 2024.
methodsThe study is based on a textual analysis of Swedish government documents published 1992-2024. Drawing on theories of policy narratives, a thematic content analysis of 132 Swedish government-issued documents during this period was conducted.
resultsFour episodes with a dominant narrative in each emerged from the analysis. They differ in ideas connected to policy problems and solutions in healthcare and evidence-informed decision-making. Besides ideas on the substance of the policy solutions, the ideas include different assumptions about problems they are solving, how healthcare actors are connected to problems and solutions, values that motivate the solutions, and assumptions about mechanisms that will promote sound decision-making and resource use in healthcare. These four policy narratives include one of efficiency, provision of information, and deliberation; one of equality, data, and standardisation; one of integration, synthesis of perspectives, and collaboration; and one of responsiveness and the local context of decisions.
conclusionThe study offers insights into the governance of evidence-informed decision-making in healthcare. The findings contribute to a broader understanding of implications of the evidence-informed approach on healthcare policy, and how healthcare policy is shaped by competing ideas, values and assumptions. They also contribute to the theoretical debate on policy narratives, and discursive practice in general in healthcare governance.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.