Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will make it her policy to allow pharmacies to sell vitamin B12 injections.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
To make a medicinal product available for sale in a pharmacy without a prescription, the product must be reclassified to pharmacy only status, also known as [P] medicines, by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).
This process is triggered by an application submitted to the MHRA by a company which holds a licence for the particular product. The MHRA will consider all submitted applications, with a decision to reclassify a medicine reached following a robust evaluation of the relevant data, including evidence of the safe use and supply of the product without a prescription. The company must also demonstrate in their application that the criteria specified in relevant legislation, such as the Human Medicines Regulations 2012, have been met.
In accordance with the Human Medicines Regulations 2012, regulation 62(3), Prescription-Only Medicine status will apply where: a direct or indirect danger exists to human health, even when used correctly, if used without medical supervision; there is frequently incorrect use, which could lead to direct or indirect danger to human health; further investigation of the activity or side-effects is required; or the product is normally prescribed for parenteral administration, via injection.
Currently, United Kingdom law specifies that all products administered by injection must be subject to a prescription. The MHRA is therefore unable to reclassify the status of injections, including Vitamin B12, to [P] medicines, as this would not be consistent with the legislation.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps her Department has taken to support GPs with increases in workloads; and what recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of this support.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Delivery plan for recovering access to primary care, published by NHS England in May 2023, sets out actions to cut bureaucracy and workload, which includes reducing demands of general practice (GP) time from unnecessary or low-value asks, improving the interface between primary and secondary care, and significantly streamlining the Impact and Investment Fund by reducing the number of indicators from 36 to five in 2023/24.
We are working with NHS England to increase the GP workforce in England. This includes measures to boost recruitment, address the reasons why doctors leave the profession, and encourage them to return to practice. NHS England has made available a number of recruitment and retention schemes to boost the GP workforce. This includes the National GP Induction and Refresher scheme, the Return to Practice programme, and the International Induction Programme.
Through the Additional Roles Reimbursement Scheme (ARRS), Primary Care Networks and practices have recruited over 36,000 additional staff including nursing associates, pharmacists, physiotherapists, and social prescribing link workers, hitting the Government's target to recruit 26,000 a year, ahead of the March 2024 deadline. The expanded primary care teams funded through the ARRS not only add extra clinical capacity, helping to reduce the burden on GPs, but also form the basis for multi-disciplinary teams to work on improving the care offered to patients.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps her Department is taking to improve levels of GP retention.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Delivery plan for recovering access to primary care, published by NHS England in May 2023, sets out actions to cut bureaucracy and workload, which includes reducing demands of general practice (GP) time from unnecessary or low-value asks, improving the interface between primary and secondary care, and significantly streamlining the Impact and Investment Fund by reducing the number of indicators from 36 to five in 2023/24.
We are working with NHS England to increase the GP workforce in England. This includes measures to boost recruitment, address the reasons why doctors leave the profession, and encourage them to return to practice. NHS England has made available a number of recruitment and retention schemes to boost the GP workforce. This includes the National GP Induction and Refresher scheme, the Return to Practice programme, and the International Induction Programme.
Through the Additional Roles Reimbursement Scheme (ARRS), Primary Care Networks and practices have recruited over 36,000 additional staff including nursing associates, pharmacists, physiotherapists, and social prescribing link workers, hitting the Government's target to recruit 26,000 a year, ahead of the March 2024 deadline. The expanded primary care teams funded through the ARRS not only add extra clinical capacity, helping to reduce the burden on GPs, but also form the basis for multi-disciplinary teams to work on improving the care offered to patients.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether she has made an assessment of the potential impact of excluding ADHD spend from Mental Health Investment Standard money and Mental Health service development funding on (a) waiting lists and (b) ICB core funding.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
No such assessment has been made. We expect integrated care boards to continue to meet the Mental Health Investment Standard so that investment in mental health services increases in line with their overall increase in allocation for that year. All but one of the integrated care boards met the Mental Health Investment Standard in 2022/23.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that healthcare information is accessible to blind and partially-sighted people; and whether she has had recent discussions with NHS England on the effectiveness of the accessible information standard.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
It is the responsibility of individual National Health Service organisations and publicly funded social care providers to comply with the Accessible Information Standard (AIS) and to meet the communication needs of patients and carers with a disability, impairment or sensory loss, including blind and partially-sighted people.
NHS England has completed a review of the AIS to help ensure that everyone’s communication needs are met in health and care provision.
The review considered the effectiveness of the current AIS, how the standard is implemented and enforced in practice, and identified recommendations for improvement. Following publication of the revised standard in due course, NHS England will continue work to support its implementation with awareness raising, communication and engagement and updated e-learning modules on the AIS to ensure NHS staff are better aware of the standard and their roles and responsibilities in implementing it. The e-learning modules are accessible to everyone working in the NHS and adult social care services
A key part of the AIS review is the strengthening of assurance of compliance with implementation of the AIS. As such, an AIS self-assessment framework has been developed to support individual providers of NHS and social care services to measure their performance against the AIS and develop targeted improvement action plans to address gaps in implementation. The self-assessment framework has also been designed to help the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to gain insight into people's experiences and whether their accessible communication needs are being met, and to better understand organisational performance for inclusion in the CQC assessment framework for provider organisations.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether her Department is making funding available to (a) pharmaceutical companies and (b) researchers to conduct medical studies into B12 injectables.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department commissions research through the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). The NIHR is not currently supporting pharmaceutical companies or research specifically on injectable vitamin B12.
The NIHR welcomes funding applications for research into any aspect of human health, including injectable vitamin B12. Applications are subject to peer review and judged in open competition, with awards being made based on the importance of the topic to patients and health and care services, value for money and scientific quality.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of implementing the recommendations of the APPG on Brain Tumours report entitled Pathway to A Cure – breaking down the barriers, published on 28 February 2023; whether his Department is taking steps to support brain tumour research applications to the National Institute for Health and Care Research; and whether his Department has plans to ring-fence funding for (a) discovery, (b) translational and (c) clinical research into brain tumours.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department welcomes the All-Party Parliamentary Group report. We are taking steps to ensure that funders work closely together to coordinate work along the translational pathway, from the discovery and early translational science typically supported by the MRC, feeding through to the applied health and care research funded by the NIHR.
It is not usual practice to ring-fence funds for particular topics or conditions. As with other Government funders of health research, the NIHR does not allocate funding for specific disease areas. The level of research spend in a particular area is driven by factors including scientific potential and the number and scale of successful funding applications.
NIHR is taking action to help researchers develop high-quality proposals, including working with the Tessa Jowell Brain Cancer Mission on workshops and courses for applications in development. Similarly, the NIHR Research Support Service will support researchers applying for funding with expert advice, to help them develop the best funding applications.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
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 improve care provided to patients with (a) Crohn's disease and (b) ulcerative colitis.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
To support healthcare professionals in the early diagnosis and management of inflammatory bowel disease, including Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has produced a range of guidance, including guidance specifically on the use of faecal calprotectin tests as a way of diagnosing inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). NICE’s IBD quality standard outlines that referral to a specialist assessment for suspected IBD should be within four weeks.
NICE guidelines represent best practice and health professionals, including general practitioners, and service commissioners are expected to take them fully into account. Guidelines published by NICE are not mandatory and do not replace the judgement of clinicians in determining the most appropriate treatment for individual patients.
In addition, NHS England’s Getting it Right First Time (GIRFT) specialty report on gastroenterology, published in September 2021, sets out actions and recommendations for the National Health Service to improve patient care and ensure consistency of care across the country.
It is the responsibility of integrated care boards to make available appropriate provision to meet the health and care needs of their local population, including the diagnosis and management of IBD.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
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 the early diagnosis of (a) Crohn’s disease and (b) ulcerative colitis.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
To support healthcare professionals in the early diagnosis and management of inflammatory bowel disease, including Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has produced a range of guidance, including guidance specifically on the use of faecal calprotectin tests as a way of diagnosing inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). NICE’s IBD quality standard outlines that referral to a specialist assessment for suspected IBD should be within four weeks.
NICE guidelines represent best practice and health professionals, including general practitioners, and service commissioners are expected to take them fully into account. Guidelines published by NICE are not mandatory and do not replace the judgement of clinicians in determining the most appropriate treatment for individual patients.
In addition, NHS England’s Getting it Right First Time (GIRFT) specialty report on gastroenterology, published in September 2021, sets out actions and recommendations for the National Health Service to improve patient care and ensure consistency of care across the country.
It is the responsibility of integrated care boards to make available appropriate provision to meet the health and care needs of their local population, including the diagnosis and management of IBD.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when he expects University of Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust to receive funding to (a) rebuild at Leicester Royal Infirmary and Glenfield and (b) build new facilities at Leicester General; and if he will take steps to increase funding for building work at these facilities.
Answered by Will Quince
The New Hospital Programme continues to work closely with the Trust on the development of their plans in alignment with our national approach to standardisation for the new hospitals we have committed to build. This ensures value for money is realised in delivering new, cutting-edge facilities for staff and patients. We continue to collaborate with all trusts in the Programme to ensure the funding they receive is reflective of an ongoing assessment of costs.
Up to the end of 2022/23 University Hospitals Leicester NHS Trust scheme received £7.46 million in funding for their new hospital scheme, which includes funding for work to prepare the site for construction of the new hospital. The funding for the full scheme will only be confirmed once its full business case has been reviewed and agreed, including by HM Treasury.