Asked by: Lord Pearson of Rannoch (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Markham on 24 July (HL9409), whether they intend to make enquiries as to whether personal health budgets are available to all those receiving National Health Service Continuing Healthcare (CHC); and whether integrated care boards are providing information on personal health budgets to all those eligible for CHC, including offering them the option of taking them up, and supporting them to do so.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government have not made an assessment of whether personal health budgets are available to people receiving NHS Continuing Healthcare (CHC) that need them.
The Department is responsible for CHC policy and legislation, which includes the National Framework for NHS Continuing Healthcare and National Health Service-funded Nursing Care. Operational delivery of CHC is the responsibility of integrated care boards (ICBs) with oversight from NHS England. Quarterly performance data is used by regional NHS England teams to inform ICB assurance.
Legislation requires ICBs to provide people eligible for CHC with information about personal health budgets, to promote their availability and to provide advice and assistance with respect to requesting such budgets.
Asked by: Lord Pearson of Rannoch (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of whether direct and third-party payment Personal Healthcare Budgets for Continuing Healthcare are available to all those that need them; and what steps they are taking to ensure that NHS England provide such support when appropriate.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government has not made an assessment of whether personal health budgets are available to people receiving National Health Service Continuing Healthcare (CHC) that need them. Operational delivery of CHC is the responsibility of integrated care boards (ICBs) with oversight from NHS England. Quarterly performance data is used by regional NHS England teams to inform ICB assurance.
Legislation requires ICBs to provide people eligible for CHC with information about personal health budgets, to offer them the option of taking them up, and to support them to do so.
NHS England expects that, unless there are exceptional circumstances, everyone living in their own home who is in receipt of CHC funding will have a personal health budget. In 2022/23, approximately 30,000 individuals eligible for CHC were in receipt of a personal health budget.
Asked by: Lord Pearson of Rannoch (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what measures they have in place to ensure that treatments for children diagnosed with gender dysphoria at the Tavistock Clinic follow NHS guidance, and that all drugs and treatments are accurately assessed for their long-term effect.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
All specialised services that NHS England commission must be provided in line with the relevant service specification that NHS England publish for those services. The Gender Identity Development Service at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust is commissioned in line with NHS England’s published service specification. An Independent Multi-Professional Review Group continue to review all referrals for puberty blockers for Gender Identity Development Service patients.
Following the Cass Review’s interim recommendations, NHS England has commissioned the establishment of a research protocol which will consider the long-term impact of puberty blockers. Children will be prescribed puberty blockers as part of this protocol once it is operational.
NHS England has also established a national Children and Young People's Gender Dysphoria Research Oversight Board to oversee future research into treatments offered to children diagnosed with gender dysphoria.
Asked by: Lord Pearson of Rannoch (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether parents are informed if their child expresses a desire (1) in school, or (2) in an NHS facility, to change sex; and if not, whether they intend to introduce a right for parents to be so informed.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department for Education is working with the Minister for Women and Equalities to develop guidance to support schools in relation to gender questioning pupils. The Department for Education will publish a draft for consultation soon.
The NHS England interim service specification and clinical policies in relation to a child or young person seeking hormone interventions require assent from the parents in addition to consent from the child or young person.
Asked by: Lord Pearson of Rannoch (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Bethell on 29 April (HL15336), what assessment they have made of the supply of diamorphine; what steps they are taking to ensure that any shortage in the availability of diamorphine to NHS patients is addressed; and when they expect any such shortage to end.
Answered by Lord Bethell
The Department is aware of ongoing supply issues resulting in intermittent availability of diamorphine injections, due to manufacturing issues. Further supplies of diamorphine injections are expected to be available in June. The Department continues to work closely with all suppliers and the National Health Service to maintain supply to patients who require it. The Department has communicated this issue to the NHS, advising the need to move to alternative opioids where diamorphine is currently used.
Asked by: Lord Pearson of Rannoch (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the supply of diamorphine; and what steps they are taking to ensure that any shortage in the availability of diamorphine to NHS patients is addressed.
Answered by Lord Bethell
It has not proved possible to respond to this question in the time available before prorogation. Ministers will correspond directly with the Member.
Asked by: Lord Pearson of Rannoch (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Bethell on 17 July (HL5874), what information they hold on (1) the number of children who have been given GnHR, or any other gender re-assignment treatment, by the NHS, (2) the amount of compensation paid to patients who received such treatments but who were subsequently deemed to have been mis-diagnosed, and (3) the number of compensation claims made following such treatments.
Answered by Lord Bethell
The National Health Service currently offers the following medical treatments to under 18-year olds on gender dysphoria pathways: hormone blockers, cross sex hormones and psychological assessment. The service does not offer surgery to under 18-year olds.
Information on the number of children who have been prescribed GnHR is not available centrally, as information on prescribing drugs is collected locally. Further, the drugs used in gender identity pathways are not exclusively prescribed for such, meaning records do not reflect total patient numbers on these pathways.
Information on number of treatments and misdiagnosis is not available in the format requested.
Asked by: Lord Pearson of Rannoch (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many children have been given GnHR or any other gender re-assignment treatment by the NHS; over what period of time such treatments have been available on the NHS; and how much compensation has been paid to patients who received such treatments but who were subsequently deemed to have been misdiagnosed.
Answered by Lord Bethell
A gender identity development service for children and adolescents has been delivered by the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust since 1995.
Information on number of treatments and misdiagnosis is not available in the format requested.
Asked by: Lord Pearson of Rannoch (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord True on 4 May (HL3274), what assessment they have made of the other factors that are potentially contributing to the increased death rate; what estimate they have made of the number of non-COVID-19 related deaths resulting from the measures taken to prepare for a surge in NHS hospital admissions; and how many operations were cancelled or postponed in anticipation of a surge in COVID-19 cases.
Answered by Lord Bethell
No formal assessment has yet been made of other factors contributing to excess deaths, but the Department is carrying out extensive work with Public Health England, the Office for National Statistics and the Care Quality Commission to better understand the virus and causes of excess deaths.
The National Health Service does not collect data on operations which have been cancelled or postponed on a national level, except for on the day urgent cancellations for non-clinical reasons. About five operations each day are urgently cancelled for non-clinical reasons, although this is a significantly small subset of cancellations. Information on the data held on cancelled elective operations can be found in Cancelled Elective Operations, which is attached.
Asked by: Lord Pearson of Rannoch (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many operations to treat cancer have been cancelled as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic; and what assessment have they made of when such operations could resume.
Answered by Lord Bethell
The first published data covering the period of the COVID-19 outbreak for the month of March will be available during May.
National Health Service providers have previously been asked to maintain access to essential cancer surgery and other treatment throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, in line with guidance from the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges and NHS England and NHS Improvement. Exceptions have been where clinicians consider that for an individual patient the risk of the procedure at the current time outweighs the benefit to the patient.
Local systems and Cancer Alliances are continuing to identify surgical capacity for cancer, and providers must protect and deliver cancer surgery and cancer treatment by ensuring that cancer surgery hubs are fully operational. Full use should be made of the available contracted independent sector hospital and diagnostic capacity locally and regionally.
Cancer treatment must be brought back to pre-pandemic levels at the earliest opportunity to minimise potential harm, and to reduce the scale of the post-pandemic surge in demand.