Personal budgets for people with disabilities: A systematic review of the literature

The aim of this article is to discuss the efficacy of the welfare action commonly known as the «Personal Budget» (PB), which stands for the development of reforms reorganizing the funds for social and health benefits, allocated directly to people with disabilities, allowing them to choose and pay for needed supports. The article drafts a systematic literature review of the topic, selecting both scientific articles and reports produced by national stakeholders. Thus, it analyses to what extent, according to the explored literature, the PB is succeeding in making the health and social support for people with disabilities more individually tailored, in empowering them and therefore, improving their quality of life. The results indicate that the PB reaches the goal of better-assessing people with disabilities’ special needs; nevertheless, the PB is still far from accomplishing its more ambitious aims, such as guaranteeing active citizens’ rights to all people with special needs.