Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the implications for his policies and those of NHS England of the gastroenterology Getting It Right First Time Programme National Specialty Report: Proposed Recommendations; and what steps (a) his Department and (b) NHS England plan to take in response to those recommendations in helping to ensure that people living with inflammatory bowel disease receive consistent care across the country.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Getting It Right First Time (GIRFT) national specialty report on gastroenterology was published in September 2021. Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is one of the conditions covered under gastroenterological services in the report. The report sets out actions and recommendations to improve patient care in gastroenterology. The aim is to reduce unwarranted variation in treatments and services in, which will ensure consistent care is provided to IBD patients across the country.
The GIRFT programme is now embedded within NHS England and NHS Improvement’s programmes to improve quality and productivity, so that best practice is adopted throughout the NHS. NHS England and NHS Improvement are encouraging individual sites to evaluate how best to take forward these recommendations. The recommendation on IBD is estimated to reduce emergency admissions by 6,600 per year. The Department and NHS England and NHS Improvement expect National Health Service trusts and clinical teams to consider how best they can implement these recommendations for individuals to ensure the consistent and high quality care for IBD and other gastroenterological conditions.
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps (a) his Department and (b) NHS England are taking to ensure that best practice set out by the Getting It Right First Time programme in areas including inflammatory bowel disease are adopted throughout the NHS.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Getting It Right First Time (GIRFT) national specialty report on gastroenterology was published in September 2021. Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is one of the conditions covered under gastroenterological services in the report. The report sets out actions and recommendations to improve patient care in gastroenterology. The aim is to reduce unwarranted variation in treatments and services in, which will ensure consistent care is provided to IBD patients across the country.
The GIRFT programme is now embedded within NHS England and NHS Improvement’s programmes to improve quality and productivity, so that best practice is adopted throughout the NHS. NHS England and NHS Improvement are encouraging individual sites to evaluate how best to take forward these recommendations. The recommendation on IBD is estimated to reduce emergency admissions by 6,600 per year. The Department and NHS England and NHS Improvement expect National Health Service trusts and clinical teams to consider how best they can implement these recommendations for individuals to ensure the consistent and high quality care for IBD and other gastroenterological conditions.
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment (a) his Department and (b) NHS England have made of the impact of the findings contained within the recent Getting it Right First Time national report on gastroenterology and on inflammatory bowel disease patients.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Getting It Right First Time (GIRFT) national specialty report on gastroenterology was published in September 2021. Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is one of the conditions covered under gastroenterological services in the report. The report sets out actions and recommendations to improve patient care in gastroenterology. The aim is to reduce unwarranted variation in treatments and services in, which will ensure consistent care is provided to IBD patients across the country.
The GIRFT programme is now embedded within NHS England and NHS Improvement’s programmes to improve quality and productivity, so that best practice is adopted throughout the NHS. NHS England and NHS Improvement are encouraging individual sites to evaluate how best to take forward these recommendations. The recommendation on IBD is estimated to reduce emergency admissions by 6,600 per year. The Department and NHS England and NHS Improvement expect National Health Service trusts and clinical teams to consider how best they can implement these recommendations for individuals to ensure the consistent and high quality care for IBD and other gastroenterological conditions.
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make an assessment of the need to increase funding for Inflammatory Bowel Disease services in line with recent prevalence figures.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The majority of services for people with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) are commissioned locally by clinical commissioning groups (CCGs), who are allocated funding from NHS England and NHS Improvement using the CCG funding allocation formula. This formula takes into consideration attributes of local populations to assess the level of need.
NHS England and NHS Improvement commission some specialist services for patients with complex IBD. Funding decisions for these are made in line with local priorities and in the context of the interim funding regime in place during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
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 develop a long-term strategy to improve services and care for adults and children with inflammatory bowel disease.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
We have no specific plans to do so. However, NHS England and NHS Improvement are working with front-line clinical experts, patient representative groups and leading charities, including Crohn’s and Colitis UK, to improve diagnosis and treatment of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). This includes a new IBD RightCare scenario, which will set out high-quality joined-up care at every point of the patient journey, as well as data packs for local commissioners.
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what criteria is being used to prioritise clinically vulnerable, moderate risk, people with inflammatory bowel disease for the covid-19 vaccine; and which healthcare professionals are responsible for identifying those patients and adding them to the appropriate vaccination list.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation current view is that inflammatory bowel disease is not in itself an indicator of increased risk of serious outcomes from COVID-19. However where an individual is, as a result of disease or treatment, immunosuppressed they may be either defined as clinically extremely vulnerable (CEV) and therefore are prioritised in priority group 4 in Phase 1 of the vaccine programme or if the immunosuppression is less severe will have been included in priority group 6. Clinicians responsible for individuals’ care, whether in hospital or in primary care, are primarily responsible for ensuring they are in the appropriate priority group. Anyone who is concerned that they have not been yet offered vaccination but believe they do meet the criteria for either group 4 or 6 may wish to discuss with their general practitioner or hospital clinician.
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he plans to offer people who have received the full course of covid-19 vaccines abroad the option of not having to quarantine on arrival to the UK.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We currently have no plans to do so.
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps have been taken to ensure that specialists regularly update the Shielded Patient List in respect of clinically extremely vulnerable people during the covid-19 outbreak for people with inflammatory bowel disease.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Inflammatory bowel disease is not a condition that automatically identifies someone as clinically extremely vulnerable. However, there may be individuals with inflammatory bowel disease who are classed as clinically extremely vulnerable because of other clinical conditions, or as a result of the findings of the QCOVID predictive risk model.
Guidance on how clinicians can update the Shielded Patient List is regularly issued to the National Health Service and is available at the following link:
https://digital.nhs.uk/coronavirus/shielded-patient-list
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of the (a) support available to and (b) capacity of the breast imaging and diagnostic workforce.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Health Education England (HEE) welcomes Professor Sir Mike Richards’ report ‘Diagnostics Recovery and Renewal’, which stated that major expansion and reform of the diagnostic services is needed over the next five years to facilitate recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and to meet rising demand across multiple aspects of diagnostics.
HEE is working with system partners on the longer-term strategy that will also consider further the diagnostic and breast imaging workforce needs beyond 2021. This planning is fully aligned with the NHS Long Term Plan, the NHS People Plan and associated ambitions for further development of cancer services. This will include exploring sustainable growth beyond 2021 in key professions through continued investment in training places, with a greater focus on attracting and retaining students and improving the numbers of qualified professionals who go on to work in the National Health Service.
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the rate of infection with covid-19 is for (a) young people aged 11-17 and (b) adults over 18 years old in the UK.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We do not have the rate of infection (R) of COVID-19 for different age groups. The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies publishes the R number for the United Kingdom on a weekly basis.
R is not usually a useful measure on its own and needs to be considered alongside the number of new cases. More information can be found at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/the-r-number-in-the-uk