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Written Question
Parkinson's Disease: Health Services
Wednesday 27th March 2024

Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps she is taking to help ensure patients diagnosed with Parkinson's disease receive an appointment with a specialist within six weeks.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence’s (NICE) guidance, Parkinson’s disease: Diagnosis and management in primary and secondary care, updated in 2017, sets out best practice for clinicians in the identification and treatment of Parkinson’s disease in line with the latest available evidence. The guidance states that if Parkinson’s disease is suspected, people should be referred quickly and without treatment to a specialist with expertise in the differential diagnosis of this condition.

We expect integrated care boards (ICBs) and National Health Service trusts to have due regard to relevant NICE guidelines. It is the responsibility of ICBs to make available the appropriate provision to meet the health and care needs of their local population, in line with these NICE guidelines.

More generally, cutting waiting lists is one of the Prime Minister’s top priorities. We are making good progress on tackling the longest waits, to ensure patients get the care they need when they need it. Ambitions to eliminate long waits were set out in the elective recovery plan, with the overall aim of eliminating waits of over a year for elective care, by March 2025.

To facilitate this across elective services, we are increasing activity, with plans to spend more than £8 billion from 2022/23 to 2024/25. This includes expanding capacity through the creation of a new network of community diagnostic centres, and maximising all available independent sector capacity.


Written Question
Hospitals: Homelessness
Wednesday 27th March 2024

Asked by: Preet Kaur Gill (Labour (Co-op) - Birmingham, Edgbaston)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps her Department is taking to prevent patients (a) experiencing and (b) at risk of homelessness from being discharged from hospital to no fixed abode.

Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Department is committed to promoting safe and timely discharge for people experiencing, or at risk of, homelessness, to appropriate accommodation. Between 2020 and 2022, the Department delivered £16 million to 17 local sites, to pilot Out of Hospital Care Models to people experiencing homelessness following a hospital stay. These models provide interim accommodation, care, and support while full assessments of individual needs are carried out. There are positive preliminary findings, and a final evaluation is due next month. From this we will share learning to encourage local areas to adopt similar models.

Improving how discharges are arranged for people experiencing, or at risk of homelessness, is also supported by our wider work to improve discharge processes. We have ensured every acute hospital has access to a care transfer hub to manage discharge for people with more complex needs, who need extra support. Furthermore, in January 2024 the Department published guidance on discharging people at risk of or experiencing homelessness to support staff involved in planning safe and supportive discharge of these patients from hospital. This guidance is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/discharging-people-at-risk-of-or-experiencing-homelessness/discharging-people-at-risk-of-or-experiencing-homelessness


Written Question
Department of Health and Social Care: Darlington
Wednesday 27th March 2024

Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how much her Department spent in Darlington constituency in each financial year between 2019-20 and 2022-23.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

Information on spending in the Darlington constituency is not available in the format requested. However, the following table shows the spend of the organisations that are the closest approximation to the Darlington constituency, each year from 2019/20 to 2022/23:

2019/20

2020/21

2021/22

2022/23

NHS Darlington Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG)

£177,000,000

0

0

0

NHS Tees Valley CCG

0

£1,293,000,000

£1,502,000,000

£341,000,000

NHS North East and North Cumbria Integrated Care Board (ICB)

0

0

0

£5,171,000,000


The number and commissioning responsibilities of the CCGs, now ICBs, have changed during the period requested, and expenditure levels set out in the table are not directly comparable year-on-year. On 1 July 2022, the NHS North East and North Cumbria ICB replaced and took on responsibility for eight CCGs, including Tees Valley, which is reflected in the higher level of spend in 2022/23.


Written Question
Postural Tachycardia Syndrome
Wednesday 27th March 2024

Asked by: Catherine West (Labour - Hornsey and Wood Green)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps she is taking to support people with postural tachycardia syndrome.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

Services for postural tachycardia syndrome (PoTS) are locally commissioned and, as such, it is the responsibility of the local commissioning teams within integrated care boards to ensure that their locally commissioned services meet the needs of their local population.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence has produced a clinical knowledge summary, last revised in November 2023, which outlines the method healthcare professionals should follow for diagnosing PoTS. This summary is available at the following link:

https://cks.nice.org.uk/topics/blackouts-syncope/diagnosis/assessment/

Clinical knowledge summaries are evidence-based summaries designed to support healthcare professionals in primary care, by providing them with a readily accessible summary of the current evidence base and practical advice on best practice.


Written Question
Oral Cancer: Diagnosis
Wednesday 27th March 2024

Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what information his Department holds on the number of people diagnosed with mouth cancer in the last twelve months.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The information requested is not available for the last twelve months. The most recent data available from 2021 shows 9,018 people were diagnosed with mouth cancer in England. Further information is available at the following link:

https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/cancer-registration-statistics/england-2021---summary-counts-only


Written Question
Social Services: LGBT+ People
Wednesday 27th March 2024

Asked by: Anneliese Dodds (Labour (Co-op) - Oxford East)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent discussions she has had with Skills for Care on levels of take up of their LGBT+ Learning Framework, published in February 2023.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Department has had no recent discussions around levels of take up of the LGBTQ+ learning framework.


Written Question
Radiology: Greater London
Wednesday 27th March 2024

Asked by: Matthew Offord (Conservative - Hendon)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many 24-hr interventional radiology services are available in the North Central London area; and at what locations are those services.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

Twenty-four-hour interventional radiology services are available on site in two hospitals in the North Central London area, namely the Royal Free Hospital and University College London Hospital. There are agreed referral pathways in place between providers across North Central London to access these services.


Written Question
Continuing Care: Expenditure
Wednesday 27th March 2024

Asked by: Caroline Lucas (Green Party - Brighton, Pavilion)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Answer of 12 October 2021 to Question 51702 on NHS: Expenditure, how much and what proportion of the NHS budget was spent on continuing healthcare in each financial year between 2015-16 and 2021-22.

Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

NHS Continuing Healthcare (CHC) spend data includes Standard CHC, Fast Track CHC and Personal Health Budgets (PHBs). This data for the requested period is shown in the attached table.


Written Question
Euthanasia: Health Services
Wednesday 27th March 2024

Asked by: Christopher Chope (Conservative - Christchurch)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment she has made of the potential impact on NHS services of the introduction of legislation to permit assisted dying.

Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

No assessment has been made.


Written Question
Health Professions: Career Development
Tuesday 26th March 2024

Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether she has made an assessment of the potential implications for her policies of the Scottish Government's publication entitled Healthcare Science in Scotland: Defining Our Strategic Approach, published on 14 March 2024, and if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of establishing a similar strategy for England.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Department has not made an assessment of the publication, Healthcare Science in Scotland: Defining Our Strategic Approach. NHS England published the NHS Long Term Workforce Plan in June 2023, which sets out future National Health Service workforce requirements for England, including with respect to healthcare scientists.

The plan assesses that education and training places for healthcare scientists need to increase by 20 to 34%, reaching between 930 to 1,039 places by 2033/34. The ambition set out in this plan is to increase training places for healthcare scientists by 32%, to over 1,000 places by 2031/32. We will work towards achieving this ambition by increasing training places by 13%, to over 850 places, by 2028/29.