Asked by: Stephen Timms (Labour - East Ham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if NHS England will (a) fund and (b) publish a data dashboard to help integrated care boards commission children and young people’s palliative and end of life care.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England has developed an all-age palliative and end of life care dashboard, which brings together all relevant local data in one place in an easily accessible format. The dashboard is accessible to integrated care boards (ICBs) and their commissioners and helps them understand the palliative and end of life care needs of their local population, including children and young people. This supports commissioners in their statutory duty for palliative and end of life care, enabling ICBs to put plans in place to address and track the improvement of health inequalities, and ensure that funding is distributed fairly based on prevalence.
Funding has been confirmed to ensure continued maintenance of the dashboard for 2024/25, with discussions ongoing regarding further development and use. There is, however, existing publicly available data, such as the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities ‘Fingertips’ data on palliative and end of life care.