To match an exact phrase, use quotation marks around the search term. eg. "Parliamentary Estate". Use "OR" or "AND" as link words to form more complex queries.


Keep yourself up-to-date with the latest developments by exploring our subscription options to receive notifications direct to your inbox

Written Question
Focal Therapy
Monday 27th March 2023

Asked by: Lord Aberdare (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to increase awareness among (1) patients, and (2) medical professionals, of the use of focal therapies including focused ultrasound to treat cancer patients.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

While focal therapies offer promise, they are not yet recommended for wider adoption and spread across the National Health Service because more evidence is needed. As part of developing their guidance and recommendations, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence seeks input from professionals and patient associations and, through its clinical commissioning policy route, NHS England encourages clinicians working in the NHS in England to submit new policy topics to enable patients to quickly benefit from innovative, evidence-based treatments.


Written Question
Focal Therapy
Monday 27th March 2023

Asked by: Lord Aberdare (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they have taken to reduce the regional variation across the UK in access to treatment for focal therapies including focused ultrasound.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

While focal therapies offer promise, they are not yet recommended for wider adoption and spread across the National Health Service because more evidence is needed. As part of developing their guidance and recommendations, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence seeks input from professionals and patient associations and, through its clinical commissioning policy route, NHS England encourages clinicians working in the NHS in England to submit new policy topics to enable patients to quickly benefit from innovative, evidence-based treatments.


Written Question
Focal Therapy
Monday 27th March 2023

Asked by: Lord Aberdare (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the potential use of focal therapies in supporting the NHS to address the cancer treatment backlog.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

While focal therapies offer promise, they are not yet recommended for wider adoption and spread across the National Health Service because more evidence is needed. As part of developing their guidance and recommendations, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence seeks input from professionals and patient associations and, through its clinical commissioning policy route, NHS England encourages clinicians working in the NHS in England to submit new policy topics to enable patients to quickly benefit from innovative, evidence-based treatments.


Written Question
Pancreatic Cancer
Wednesday 28th April 2021

Asked by: Lord Aberdare (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty's Government how many pancreatic cancer surgeries have been cancelled in each month since January 2020.

Answered by Lord Bethell

The data requested on cancelled surgery is not collected centrally.


Written Question
Pancreatic Cancer
Wednesday 28th April 2021

Asked by: Lord Aberdare (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty's Government how many people have been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in each month since January 2020; and what percentage of those diagnoses have been at Stage (1) 1, (2) 2, (3) 3, and (4) 4, respectively.

Answered by Lord Bethell

The number of diagnoses of pancreatic cancer by stage of diagnosis in 2020 is not yet available. The stage group by cancer type for diagnoses in 2020 is expected to be published in 2022.


Written Question
First Aid: Education
Wednesday 28th September 2016

Asked by: Lord Aberdare (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, in the light of the finding of the recent British Red Cross research report <i>Are prehospital deaths from trauma and accidental injury preventable? </i>that up to 59 per cent of pre-hospital deaths from injury could have been prevented with basic first aid, what they are doing to ensure that first aid education features within public health strategies.

Answered by Baroness Chisholm of Owlpen

The Government recognises that the timely application of first aid can help minimise the impact of injuries, as well as health conditions such as heart attacks and strokes, and contribute to avoiding preventable deaths.

The NHS Choices website contains information for the public on first aid responses to various injuries and health incidents including burns, bleeding, choking, drowning, fractures, heart attacks, strokes and poisoning; the possible symptoms to note; how to respond to them; and how to administer cardiopulmonary resuscitation. A copy of the relevant NHS Choices web page is attached.

In addition, the Government is making available another £1 million to make public access defibrillators and coronary pulmonary resuscitation training more widely available in communities across England. This builds on last year’s funding of £1 million, which provided almost 700 more publicly accessible defibrillators in communities across England and increased the numbers of people trained in cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

The national Act Fast campaign also aims to raise awareness of the symptoms of stroke, teach people what to look out for in themselves and others, and encourage those who notice the symptoms to call 999. Since Act Fast launched in 2009, it is estimated that an additional 47,000 people reached hospital within the vital three-hour window and over 5,000 fewer people became disabled as a result of a stroke.

Local authorities in England have the lead responsibility for identifying and meeting needs for local interventions to improve the health of their populations, including steps to reduce preventable deaths.


Written Question
Pancreatic Cancer: Diagnosis
Tuesday 14th July 2015

Asked by: Lord Aberdare (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of (1) the number, and (2) the proportion, of pancreatic cancer patients whose diagnosis is made following an emergency admission; and how those figures compare with patients of other cancer types.

Answered by Lord Prior of Brampton

The Routes to Diagnosis study defines a methodology by which the route the patient follows to the point of diagnosis can be categorised, in order to examine demographic, organisational, service and personal reasons for delayed diagnosis.

Administrative Hospital Episode Statistics data are combined with cancer waiting times data, data from the cancer screening programmes and cancer registration data from the National Cancer Data Repository.

Using these datasets every case of cancer registered in England which was diagnosed in 2006-2010 is categorised into one of eight ‘Routes to Diagnosis’.

The methodology is described in detail in the British Journal of Cancer article Routes to Diagnosis for cancer - Determining the patient journey using multiple routine datasets, which can be found at the following link and is also attached.

http://www.nature.com/bjc/journal/v107/n8/full/bjc2012408a.html

Emergency presentations are defined as “an emergency route via A&E, emergency GP referral, emergency transfer, emergency admission or attendance.” More detail can be found in the attached technical document.

Data on all malignant neoplasms (excluding non-melanoma skin cancer) and pancreatic cancer was taken from the “Routes to diagnosis 2006-2010 workbook (a)” – this can also be found in the attached article.

The Emergency Presentation Route is the principle route to diagnosis for patients with pancreatic cancer. This reflects the lack of easily recognisable symptoms of early disease, with advanced disease often presenting with the acute onset of jaundice.

The percentage of emergency presentations ranges from 3% for melanoma to 63% for acute lymphoblastic leukaemia.

Table 1: Percentage of diagnoses by emergency presentation route, England, persons, 2006-2010

Number of cases

Number of cases by emergency presentation route

Percentage by emergency presentation route

a

b

(b/a)x100

All malignant neoplasms

(excl. non-melanoma skin cancer)

1,272,584

291,391

23%

Pancreas

34,012

16,460

48%


Written Question
Pancreatic Cancer: Tomography
Thursday 9th July 2015

Asked by: Lord Aberdare (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to increase the capacity of imaging services available to pancreatic cancer patients across the National Health Service, including computerised tomography scans.

Answered by Lord Prior of Brampton

NHS England has a published service specification for pancreatic cancer which clearly defines what it expects to be in place for providers to offer evidence-based, safe and effective pancreatic cancer services. This service specification has been developed by specialised clinicians, commissioners, expert patients and public health representatives to describe core and developmental service standards.

Patients being treated at cancer units should have access to an upper gastrointestinal cancer nurse. All district general hospitals should have such a person in post. If the patient is transferred to a cancer centre they should then have access to a pancreatic nurse specialist. This person should see every patient and become their key worker.

Patients with suspected pancreatic cancer are usually first investigated by an ultrasound scan. If this shows biliary dilatation, or anything else suspicious, the patient should then be sent for a pancreas protocol computerised tomography scan which is the best investigation for identifying pancreatic cancer.

Increasing the capacity of diagnostic and imaging services is clearly recognised as a priority for the National Health Service and it is has been raised as a key issue by the independent Cancer Taskforce, as well as by the Cancer Waiting Times Taskforce. We expect a new cancer strategy to be published this summer which will set out the strategy for the system for the next five years and will include consideration of the whole cancer pathway, including the capacity of diagnostic services.

In addition, NHS England is testing various approaches to new models of care which could potentially deliver improved access to diagnostic services for cancer patients, including those with pancreatic cancer.


Written Question
Pancreatic Cancer: Nurses
Thursday 9th July 2015

Asked by: Lord Aberdare (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure that all pancreatic cancer patients have access to a clinical nurse specialist.

Answered by Lord Prior of Brampton

NHS England has a published service specification for pancreatic cancer which clearly defines what it expects to be in place for providers to offer evidence-based, safe and effective pancreatic cancer services. This service specification has been developed by specialised clinicians, commissioners, expert patients and public health representatives to describe core and developmental service standards.

Patients being treated at cancer units should have access to an upper gastrointestinal cancer nurse. All district general hospitals should have such a person in post. If the patient is transferred to a cancer centre they should then have access to a pancreatic nurse specialist. This person should see every patient and become their key worker.

Patients with suspected pancreatic cancer are usually first investigated by an ultrasound scan. If this shows biliary dilatation, or anything else suspicious, the patient should then be sent for a pancreas protocol computerised tomography scan which is the best investigation for identifying pancreatic cancer.

Increasing the capacity of diagnostic and imaging services is clearly recognised as a priority for the National Health Service and it is has been raised as a key issue by the independent Cancer Taskforce, as well as by the Cancer Waiting Times Taskforce. We expect a new cancer strategy to be published this summer which will set out the strategy for the system for the next five years and will include consideration of the whole cancer pathway, including the capacity of diagnostic services.

In addition, NHS England is testing various approaches to new models of care which could potentially deliver improved access to diagnostic services for cancer patients, including those with pancreatic cancer.