Asked by: James Berry (Conservative - Kingston and Surbiton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, if he will commission a review of portion sizes to inform the food industry and consumers about what constitutes a healthy portion.
Answered by Jane Ellison
Public Health England’s recent report, Sugar Reduction: The evidence for action, highlights that portion sizes have been increasing over time and that this results in more calories being consumed. We have a number of tools to help inform what constitutes a healthy portion size, for example the Front of Pack nutrition labelling scheme, the eatwell plate and the Change4Life programme.
Asked by: James Berry (Conservative - Kingston and Surbiton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the average cost to the public purse is of training one medical student; and how many qualified doctors applied for a certificate of good standing in each of the last 10 years.
Answered by Ben Gummer
The Personal Social Services Research Unit (PSSRU) at the University of Kent estimates within their report ‘Unit Costs of Health and Social Care 2014’, published March 2014, that the average cost in 2014/15 of training to become a general practitioner is £485,390 with the consultant training cost being £726,551. These figures reflect the pre-registration costs of tuition, living expenses/lost production and clinical placements and the post-graduate costs of tuition and replacement costs not the average cost to the taxpayer.
The Department does not keep information centrally on how many doctors applied for a certificate of good standing in each of the last 10 years.
Asked by: James Berry (Conservative - Kingston and Surbiton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the minimum number of hours training is that healthcare visitors must receive on providing specific care to the elderly.
Answered by Ben Gummer
The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) sets standards for the education of health visitors. Health visitor training is undertaken by already registered nurses or midwives who will have had to meet the relevant NMC standards which require a minimum of 4,600 hours of theory and practice learning. To qualify as a health visitor requires an additional 45 weeks of programmed learning, split equally between theory and practice.
The NMC document, Standards of proficiency for specialist community public health nurses, sets out the requirements that health visitors need to meet to be registered. Although there are no specific requirements regarding the care of the elderly, the NMC has a role to ensure health visitors have the right skills and qualities when they start work.