NHS: Dementia Commission Report

Lord Patel Excerpts

Thursday 22nd February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Markham (Con)]

Yes, that is a very good point. For me, as I have looked into this, the reason for assembling the panel that we can all interrogate is that we have the value of different noble Lords in this House who can add those points to it. What the noble Lord said sounds sensible. The honest answer is that I do not know whether there is such a person today, but let us use this as an opportunity to find out, because I think there should be.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, there are several important points in development that should allow us to better manage people with dementia. The first is early diagnosis, as has been mentioned, but we need greater input into research in developing biomarkers that detect early development of the disease. Having done so, we then need drugs that will be effective in early phases of the disease—so-called disease-modifying treatments. Some of those have recently been given accelerated approval in the United States and Japan, but they are very expensive drugs. As we discussed last week, one of the drugs for small-cell lung cancer failed at the final endpoint, so we have to be guarded. For instance, the drug lecanemab, which has been approved, would use up half the pharmaceutical costs of all the 27 countries of Europe. These two things are important, and I hope that the forum that is developing will address those issues of research.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

As ever, my colleague the noble Lord is correct. The blood biomarkers are central to this. We have set up the NIHR biomarker challenge to try to understand those, and my understanding is that a Swedish blood test is quite promising. NICE is bound to approve the two early-stage drugs that the noble Lord mentioned over the summer, in July and September, but then we need to look at scale-up issues. Often, we are talking about having to deliver them through drips, which means a whole workforce scale-up. So there are a lot of issues around this that the noble Lord rightly brings up, and I hope the panel can discuss them further.

Premature Deaths: Heart and Circulatory Conditions

Lord Patel Excerpts

Tuesday 6th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Markham (Con)]

I thank the noble Baroness and draw attention to my register of interests: I am a shareholder in a small health company that does high-end heart tests for the private sector.

It is fitting that February is Heart Month. The concern that the noble Baroness raises is exactly the one that noble Lords will have heard me speak about. This is precisely the concern that Chris Whitty, our Chief Medical Officer, was worried about during Covid, with missed appointments because people stopped going to see their doctor meaning that we missed things such as high blood pressure and high cholesterol. To tackle the problem urgently, as the noble Baroness suggests, we have put 7,500 blood pressure checkers in pharmacies. They have done 2 million checks to date. We have sent 270,000 blood pressure monitors to houses and have instigated mid-life NHS health checks to look specifically at early heart indicators so that we can try to tackle the problem that the pandemic caused.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, we have had lots of plans and initiatives for reducing deaths from heart disease. Despite that, variation in both preventive care and outcomes have persisted for years now. They are exaggerated by deprivation and ethnicity.

Let me give two examples. First, 40% of people with high blood pressure have failed to be diagnosed— I know that the Government have an initiative for pharmacies checking blood pressure—and, even when they are diagnosed, 10% of them do not get the appropriate medication. Secondly, there are examples of people suffering from atrial fibrillation not getting the appropriate anti-coagulation treatment; we then find that 60% of the strokes that occur in these patients are because they have not been properly medicated.

It is these variations in care and prevention that we need to tackle. It is disappointing to see that some of the ICB plans do not take on the need to reduce this variation, particularly in deprived areas.

NHS: Fracture Liaison Services

Lord Patel Excerpts

Monday 5th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Markham (Con)]

I thank the noble Lord. His interventions around the communications side are always welcome, because we recognise that it is one thing having a service and another thing making sure that the world knows about it. I will go and find out more and write to the noble Lord.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, the fracture liaison service originally started in Glasgow, with the particular intention of identifying mostly women who had a higher risk of fractures from osteoporosis. In England and Wales, a fracture liaison service audit has been established now for several years. How do the Government receive the learning from those audits and how do they implement the learning that they receive?

[Lord Markham (Con)]

The noble Lord is correct; there has been some good evidence gained. As I mentioned previously, it shows that the probability of suffering from a fracture if you have been in a clinic is 10%—some studies have shown as much as 30% to 40%. It also shows, as my noble friend Lord Black was saying, that there is actually a good cost saving: it is thought that £65 million per annum will give a return of more than £100 million. There are some very good statistics around this, and I assure noble Lords that we are making a strong case for their expansion.

Maternity Services

Lord Patel Excerpts

Thursday 25th January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Bolton, for initiating the debate today on maternity services in England—or should I say, as has already been mentioned, the woeful state of maternity services in England as evidenced by a series of recent reports on their failings. Although we are debating maternity services, what we are really talking about is the state of care the nation is willing to provide for the mothers of the nation and their babies—the future citizens who will shape our nation.

I should say at the outset that I am well aware that good quality maternity services depend on the care and expertise that the key profession—midwives—provides. The rest of us, including obstetricians like me, are there to support them. I therefore fully subscribe to all the comments made about shortages of midwives and the quality of midwife care.

Before I go any further, I need to declare my interest: I am a lifelong obstetrician. I spent 37 years of my working life being one, and every minute of it was a joy and a pleasure. I would go back to it tomorrow if they let me—but they will not. I am also a fellow of several Royal Colleges, but that is totally irrelevant.

I am pleased to take this opportunity to put on record my eternal gratitude to all the thousands of mothers who afforded me the privilege of being a part of their lives at the most important time of their lives: during their pregnancy and the birth of their baby. I learned that pregnancy and childbirth give a whole new meaning to the word “beautiful”.

I had a special interest in looking after mothers who had preexisting conditions that could affect their pregnancy and the unborn baby, or who developed complications that may have threatened their pregnancy and the life of their baby. I was privileged to be able to do so. Understandably, these mothers were anxious and hoped all would go well. I remember one occasion when I delivered the healthy baby of a first-time mother who had diabetes and had had quite a challenging time during her pregnancy, to say the least. I noticed the pleasure on her face—I have seen it a thousand times; it is quite remarkable when a mother sees her baby for the first time—and I asked her how she felt. After thinking for a minute, she said: “I know the days will be shorter and the nights longer; clothes will be shabbier, but the future will be happier. I will forget the past. The baby will make love stronger. I was a woman yesterday; I am a mother today”. I will never forget that. To witness the joy in her face was a privilege. Sadly, according to recent reports, this is not the case for hundreds, if not thousands, of mothers. It should not be so. We should be ashamed that it is so for even one mother—but it is so for thousands, according to the reports already mentioned.

I was fortunate to be part of a team of professionals—midwives, obstetricians, anaesthetists, neonatologists and others—who were all committed to providing the best possible personalised care to all mothers and their babies. We never lost a mother in three decades, and had zero tolerance to intrapartum stillbirths. Weekly perinatal meetings were mandatory for all to attend to make sure that adverse events were fully discussed, learned from and never repeated.

The Government believe, as was noted by the noble Baroness, Lady Cumberlege, that the NHS is one of the safest places in the world to give birth. Minister, it was. In the past, our maternity services were where others came to learn. Why were our maternity units regarded as the best? It was because, as now, dedicated professionals provided safe, compassionate care to mothers and their babies, and took pride in doing so; and, importantly, they were left alone to get on with it.

Multiple reports from the CQC, as has already been mentioned, and independent investigations into several maternity units in England have shown that care is not safe, resulting in unacceptably high levels of harm to mothers and their babies. We all know that there are more such reports to come. While workforce shortages, pressures of work, lack of communication, and poor governance are all cited as possible problems, and they undoubtably are and need to be addressed, I believe that the genesis of the long-standing problems is deeper and goes further back. Therefore, I support absolutely the plea made by the noble Baroness, Lady Cumberlege, for a new beginning for maternity services.

The response from the Government and organisations responsible for the delivery of maternity services to adverse reports is to produce more documents about what they will do—set up a task force, a workforce plan that may deliver in five or 10 years, safety organisations, three-year plans, long-term plans, and much more. These lack implementation plans or regular outputs to demonstrate success.

The quality of maternity services is a bellwether for the quality of services in the rest of the NHS. Levels of maternal and perinatal deaths are good indicators of the quality of maternity services, as evidenced by several of the investigations. In this respect, as has already been mentioned, the latest maternal mortality report is a cause for concern in many ways. Confidential inquiries into maternal deaths were formally established in 1954, although their predecessor existed from 1928: it is the world’s longest-running successful audit system of healthcare and is a good barometer of the performance of the maternity service.

As has been mentioned, the latest report from MBRRACE of deaths between January 2020 and December 2022 shows that the rate of maternal deaths was 13.41 deaths per 100,000 maternities. That is the highest in the last two decades and much higher than the rate of 8.79 among the 2017-2019 cohort. Even after removing deaths due to Covid-19, the rate is significantly higher than among that cohort. The UK now has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the developed world, compared with Norway’s 2.79, Germany’s 4.0—which, by the way, has remained static for 20 years—and France’s 6.0. We are way behind.

The main causes are important. The first is thromboembolic disease. We require a clear strategy for how we are going to reduce this, because it has remained the number one cause now for decades. I urge the professionals—the Royal College of Midwives and the general practitioners, obstetricians and psychiatrists—to come together to produce clear guidelines on how these deaths will be reduced. The second is cardiac disease. These deaths are preventable. Third, importantly and very tragically, are suicide deaths. These are vulnerable women whose mental health condition is not difficult to recognise during the antenatal period. They are women who might be abused in the house; women who are further abused when they take home a baby. We should not, as a society or as professionals, fail them, but we do. These 39 suicide deaths are tragic deaths: all maternal deaths are tragic, but these are particularly so. They are preventable and we should address that.

Maternal deaths also show up gross inequalities related to ethnicity and deprivation, as has already been mentioned several times. Black mothers have four times the risk, Asian mothers have twice the risk and mothers from deprived populations have twice the risk. These are not new or surprise findings, as mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Bolton: inequalities in care and outcomes have been well documented for a long time. The Government have produced plans to try to reduce these, but none has shown any results. Can the Minister say which of the plethora of initiatives to reduce harm, deaths and inequalities in maternal health have had any effect? What benefits have been derived from the work of the Maternity Inequalities Oversight Forum, the Maternity and Neonatal Care National Oversight Group, the Maternity Disparities Taskforce, or the several other initiatives, in reducing inequalities and the deaths of mothers and babies and improving maternity services?

What we do have are repeated reports of high-profile organisational failures, soaring clinical negligence claims, huge variations in outcomes and in the culture of care, workforce challenges, inequalities in care and outcomes linked to ethnicity and depravation, rising maternal and perinatal deaths, and serious safety issues, to the point that the regulator, the CQC, says that England’s maternity units currently have the poorest safety ratings of any hospital services it inspects. Does this not all add up to a service that needs radical reform? Is it not time we had a root-and-branch independent review of maternity services that brings about the changes needed to have a world-class service that is compassionate, safe and delivers world-leading outcomes for mothers and babies? Can the Minister say why we should not have such a review, as part of his answer as to what difference all the initiatives so far have made to improve the service, with real figures to demonstrate it? I know he is fond of data as evidence.

Smoking

Lord Patel Excerpts

Thursday 25th January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords—

[Baroness Blackstone (Lab)]

My Lords, I refer to my interests as set out in the register. Would the Minister agree that smoking in pregnancy has enormously damaging effects, leading to much poorer birth outcomes than for mothers who do not smoke? Would he also agree that incentives to pregnant women not to smoke have been very effective? In the light of this, could he give a guarantee that the existing scheme, which comes to an end this year, will be continued with adequate resources, so that it is not in any way disrupted?

[Lord Markham (Con)]

I totally agree with the noble Baroness on the importance of stopping smoking—always, but especially during pregnancy. In fact, we have a maternity debate coming straight after this, where this will be one of the things that we discuss. I hope, from showing that we are putting all this spend in place, that we are backing everything that works. As long as the anti-smoking in pregnancy measure continues to work, that will be one of the major features to make sure that we are continuing to stop all activity, but especially in pregnant ladies.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, in the light of the last question, I will change my question. What assessment have the Government made of the long-term harm that vaping will cause, particularly to young people?

[Lord Markham (Con)]

The honest answer is that we do not know yet, and that is a problem. As we know, a number of these things take time to play through. That is why we want to make sure we take a precautionary approach. In this legislation, we aim to really stop anything that is targeted at young people in terms of vaping. We see vaping as an important tool to help people quit smoking, but we are equally sure that we never want anyone to start vaping. That is why we will also look at banning anything that targets young people, such as flavouring and packaging. We want to stop anything targeted at youth vaping.

Adult Social Care: Staffing

Lord Patel Excerpts

Tuesday 12th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Markham (Con)]

Charging reform is still part of the Government’s commitment. At the same time, I think we all recognise that, largely as a result of the pandemic, we had to stabilise the social care situation first. That is what the £8.1 billion in funding has been all about and what the investment and recruitment have been for—so that we can stabilise first. I am glad to say that we are reaching a more stable footing. For the first time, staffing went up over last year and, likewise, the number of people in social care went up. We have to stabilise before we move on to the reform. I think we would all agree that the speed of reform needs to be a bit quicker, but it is sensible that we stabilise the situation first.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, in the Government’s search for long-term sustainable funding for adult social care, what assessment have they made of the successful models that operate in Germany and Japan, for instance?

[Lord Markham (Con)]

The shorthand for the German system is the “double doughnut”, which tries to give wraparound care. We can learn many things from that system, which is why a part 2 reform needs to happen here. I accept that we are clearly not there yet.

Cancer Research UK Report

Lord Patel Excerpts

Tuesday 5th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Markham (Con)]

Yes, we are taking extensive action on the obesity front. As well as being a major cause of cancer, it is the cause of a lot of ill health. We have taken a lot of action against 96% of the reasons given in obesity research on calorific intake, with regard to what people buy in supermarkets. Also, the soft drinks industry levy—the sugar tax—has decreased sugar in drinks by at least 14%.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, I congratulate CRUK on producing this magnificent report and manifesto. Continuing with the theme of research, the report identifies the necessity of further closing the funding gap in research of about £1 billion in the next decade. This research is in key areas where our scientists are leaders in the world, such as the early detection of cancer using cell-free DNA and technologies such as messenger RNA for vaccine production, using genomes and early protein expressions for early diagnosis. The Minister mentioned the key area of reducing lung cancer using known technology, but it is in discovery science where we need to increase funding, especially when government funding falls far behind charity funding, particularly from CRUK.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

I agree that research funding is key. That is why I mentioned the £100 million that we spent in 2021-22. The Medical Research Council is also spending £125 million per annum on cancer research. That is allowing us to introduce vital things such as the point-of-care cancer treatments that our regulators that have brought in ahead of anyone else in Europe, showing the key flexibility that our regulators now have, meaning that people can have individualised cancer care. I agree that we need to invest in these sorts of activities.

Children’s Hospices: Funding

Lord Patel Excerpts

Tuesday 14th November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Markham (Con)]

First, I absolutely recognise the noble Lord’s point that 80% of hospices’ funding comes through charities, so they represent an excellent resource for us. That is why we are pleased to confirm the £25 million for next year. The debate, which I am sure we will get into more later, is about making it a direct grant. We generally think that ICBs are best placed to take control of health services in their area, and it is about trying to get the right balance between making direct grants for the provision of places and saying that ICBs know what is best for their area and should cater for them in that way. I would be happy to talk further about that balance with the noble Lord.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, should we not be ashamed that care for children at the end of their short lives is funded by village fetes, cake shops and elderly marathon runners instead of by central government? The total cost of 34 children’s hospices is £130 million and the totality of it should be funded centrally, not as unguaranteed £25 million grants every year. We should be ashamed of this.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

To put this into context again, only about 6% of children’s deaths occur in hospices, so 94% happen in other settings. I want to get that right for the context of all this. There are many parts to this; hospices are quite close to my heart and I want to donate to them charitably. There are many parts of society where we think there is a role for charities to add value and enhance the system, rather than their being crowded out by government-funded sources all the time.

Domestic Violence and Brain Injury

Lord Patel Excerpts

Monday 23rd October 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Markham (Con)]

The noble Baroness is correct. We need to make sure that all our front-line services are trained to identify potential brain injuries—that is A&E, GP surgeries, the police and schools. There is already a programme in schools for children affected by domestic violence. We have also made sure that every ICB has to appoint a domestic violence and sexual abuse lead, so that they can identify these sorts of issues.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, data collection and research is very good news. However, under normal circumstances, any person who suffers a head injury, for whatever reason, would be subjected to immediate testing for a brain injury. Why would that not be the case for someone who suffers a head injury from domestic violence?

[Lord Markham (Con)]

It is a very good point. As all noble Lords are aware, often the challenge is getting people to come forward when they have suffered domestic violence. Some of this research shows that there are tools, such as a spit test, to understand whether someone has suffered from a traumatic brain injury. Bringing some of those things into play, so that people are identified and encouraged to come forward, is vital.

General Medical Council: Internal Guidance

Lord Patel Excerpts

Tuesday 17th October 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Markham (Con)]

I am very willing to hazard a guess that it is zero, but I will happily follow that up in writing with the exact number.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, I do not intend to be frivolous. I have looked after thousands of mothers during their pregnancies; it has been a great privilege to do so. Terms like “mother” and “women” should not be removed from any guidance, GMC or not. I have spoken to the GMC and expressed my discomfort at its removal of the words “mother” and “women”. Of course, I recognise the transgender issues. I also recognise therefore that those who may not consider themselves women could have children, but that does not remove the importance of motherhood. Being a mother is more than that; it is about motherhood and the responsibilities and what mothers contribute to children. I regret that the GMC has decided to remove these words.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

I think the noble Lord makes the point very well. I do not think I have anything to add, apart from basic agreement.