Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to increase NHS dental provision for (a) unregistered children and (b) vulnerable NHS patients in Rutland and Melton constituency.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
Dental patients are not registered to a particular practice outside a course of treatment. A practice can accept a patient for a course of treatment and there are no geographical restrictions on which dental practice a patient may attend, including those in Rutland and Melton.
In 2021/22, an additional £50 million was provided for National Health Service dentistry in the final quarter to provide urgent care to patients. The appointments were targeted to patients in most need of urgent dental treatment, including vulnerable groups and children. Between April and June 2022, NHS England and NHS Improvement have asked practices to deliver at least 95% of contracted units of dental activity to improve access for patients safely, including children and vulnerable patients. Specialist community dental services which treat particularly vulnerable people also benefited from this additional funding. Children, people with learning disabilities, autism or severe mental health problems were prioritised in these services.
The Department and NHS England and Improvement are working with stakeholders, including the British Dental Association, to improve to the NHS dental system. This aims to increase patient access, reduce health inequalities and make the NHS a more attractive place to work for dentists. Negotiations are currently underway on initial measures.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
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 to Question 3755 on Caesarean Sections: Maternity Services, if he will strengthen post natal care for mothers who have had a caesarean section in the upcoming Women's Health Strategy.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
Further information on the specific topics which will be addressed in the Women’s Health Strategy will be available in due course. We will publish the Strategy later this year.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans his Department has to strengthen post-natal care for mothers who have had a caesarean section in the upcoming Women's Health Strategy.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
Fertility, pregnancy, pregnancy loss and post-natal care will be priority areas in the forthcoming Women’s Health Strategy, which will be published later this year.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many people have received payments from the vaccines damages scheme in each of the last five years.
Answered by Maggie Throup
The Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme provides a one-off tax-free payment, currently £120,000, to successful applicants where vaccination has caused severe disablement. The following table shows the number of claimants which have received payments in each of the last five years.
Calendar year | Awards |
2018 | 4 |
2019 | 2 |
2020 | 4 |
2021 | 1 |
2022 | 0 |
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if his Department will review whether the NHS's determination of full term gestation appropriately accounts for different ethnic minority gestation periods.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
There are no current plans to do so. Gestational age is measured in weeks, from the first day of the woman's last menstrual cycle to the current date. Pregnant women are offered an ultrasound scan at approximately 10 to 14 weeks of pregnancy. One of the purposes of this scan is to confirm the gestational age of the baby and the estimated date of delivery. Most babies are born between 37 weeks and 41 weeks of pregnancy. Those born at 37 to 38 weeks are considered to be ‘early-term’ and those born at 39 to 40 weeks are considered to be ‘full-term’.
Antenatal surveillance of fetal growth is an essential part of good maternity as fetal growth restriction is directly associated with stillbirth and perinatal morbidity. The Saving Babies Lives Care Bundle includes an element on ‘Risk assessment and management of babies at risk of fetal growth restriction’. This stipulates that maternity care providers may choose to use uterine artery Doppler assessment, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists Green-Top Guideline 31: The Investigation and Management of the Small for Gestational Age Fetus, or the Growth Assessment Protocol, which uses growth charts customised for constitutional variation such as ethnic origin, maternal size and parity, to monitor standardised fundal height and estimated fetal weight.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if the Government will take steps to tackle waiting lists for access to gender identity services.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
The National Health Service is establishing pilot gender dysphoria clinics under a new delivery model for this service. Pilot clinics have already opened in London, Cheshire and Merseyside, Manchester and the East of England and a further clinic in Sussex is planned later this year. These clinics are due to begin an evaluation to establish the viability of the new clinical models. This will reduce waiting times for patients and ensure the availability of these services.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to increase childhood flu vaccination rates.
Answered by Maggie Throup
During the 2021/22 flu season, over 3.8 million school-aged children had been vaccinated by the end of January 2022. We have begun planning for the 2022/23 flu season to further increase uptake. We are working with regional commissioning teams, school-aged providers, schools and primary care providers, in addition to collaborating with COVID-19 vaccination teams to consider where those successes can be applied to the seasonal flu programme. In addition to the targeted work of locally commissioned services to meet the needs and challenges of their local populations, communications will be developed to reach all eligible groups.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what additional steps his Department is taking to support NHS dentistry provision, in addition to the £50 million of funding for dentistry announced on 25 January 2022.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
During the pandemic, NHS England and NHS Improvement have set activity thresholds for dentists which secures protection of practice National Health Service income. Access to free personal protective equipment will continue until 31 March 2023 or until infection prevention and control guidance is revised or withdrawn. Where data has indicated practices can achieve more activity safely, thresholds have been gradually increased to help improve access for patients. The current threshold is set at 85%. NHS dental practices have been asked to meet as many prioritised needs as possible, focussing first on urgent care and care for vulnerable groups, including children followed by overdue appointments.