Asked by: Jim Fitzpatrick (Labour - Poplar and Limehouse)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, if he will request Public Health England to extend its planned symptoms campaigns, as part of the Public Health England Marketing Strategy for 2014-17, to include cervical cancer symptoms.
Answered by Jane Ellison
Earlier diagnosis is essential to improving cancer survival and Be Clear on Cancer (BCOC) campaigns, which aim to raise awareness of the symptoms of specific cancers, and to encourage people with symptoms to see their doctor promptly, form an integral part of the Public Health England Marketing Plan for 2014-17 which was published in July 2014.
The decision on which cancers should be the focus of BCOC campaigns is informed by a steering group chaired by NHS England’s National Clinical Director for Cancer. Membership of the group includes primary care clinicians and representatives from the Department; Public Health England (PHE - Marketing team and the National Cancer Intelligence Network); NHS England; NHS Improving Quality; Cancer Research UK; Macmillan Cancer Support; and other stakeholders. A number of factors are taken into account when deciding which campaigns to develop and run, with one of the main criteria being the number of deaths that could be avoided through earlier diagnosis. The focus for national campaigns so far has therefore been on bowel, breast (in women over 70), bladder/kidney, lung, oesophageal and stomach (oesophago-gastric) cancers.
PHE has announced that a repeat of the national breast cancer campaign for women aged 70 and over will run in the summer from 13 July to 6 September 2015. Decisions on further BCOC campaign activity in 2015/16 will be made in due course based on evidence from previous campaigns.
PHE working with the Department, NHS England and other partners will continue to keep these campaigns under review and work with relevant experts to see what might be done to tackle other types of cancer.
Asked by: Jim Fitzpatrick (Labour - Poplar and Limehouse)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what discussions Ministers in his Department have had with Public Health England on the types of cancers that it will include in potential local pilot tests within the Be Clear on Cancer programme; and whether it is proposed that cervical cancer will be included in that programme.
Answered by Jane Ellison
Earlier diagnosis is essential to improving cancer survival and Be Clear on Cancer (BCOC) campaigns, which aim to raise awareness of the symptoms of specific cancers, and to encourage people with symptoms to see their doctor promptly, form an integral part of the Public Health England Marketing Plan for 2014-17 which was published in July 2014.
The decision on which cancers should be the focus of BCOC campaigns is informed by a steering group chaired by NHS England’s National Clinical Director for Cancer. Membership of the group includes primary care clinicians and representatives from the Department; Public Health England (PHE - Marketing team and the National Cancer Intelligence Network); NHS England; NHS Improving Quality; Cancer Research UK; Macmillan Cancer Support; and other stakeholders. A number of factors are taken into account when deciding which campaigns to develop and run, with one of the main criteria being the number of deaths that could be avoided through earlier diagnosis. The focus for national campaigns so far has therefore been on bowel, breast (in women over 70), bladder/kidney, lung, oesophageal and stomach (oesophago-gastric) cancers.
PHE has announced that a repeat of the national breast cancer campaign for women aged 70 and over will run in the summer from 13 July to 6 September 2015. Decisions on further BCOC campaign activity in 2015/16 will be made in due course based on evidence from previous campaigns.
PHE working with the Department, NHS England and other partners will continue to keep these campaigns under review and work with relevant experts to see what might be done to tackle other types of cancer.
Asked by: Jim Fitzpatrick (Labour - Poplar and Limehouse)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many complaints were made to the NHS about the care of people with dementia in hospitals in 2013-14.
Answered by Dan Poulter
These data are not collected centrally. National data in respect of written complaints to the NHS are collected by the Health and Social Care Information Centre and may be found on their website.
Asked by: Jim Fitzpatrick (Labour - Poplar and Limehouse)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many hospital staff in each hospital trust have undergone specific dementia awareness training.
Answered by Dan Poulter
The Government’s 2014-15 Mandate to Health Education England, published on 1 May 2014, states that a further 250,000 National Health Service staff will receive Tier 1 dementia awareness training by March 2015, in addition to the 100,000 NHS staff who had received Tier 1 training by March 2014. At 30 September 2014, 377,886 NHS staff had undertaken the Tier 1 training.
Asked by: Jim Fitzpatrick (Labour - Poplar and Limehouse)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment NHS England has made of the effect on the 8am to 8pm seven-day-a-week service operated by the Barkantine Health Centre of the decision by NHS England to separate the walk-in centre at that location from the general services.
Answered by Jane Ellison
We are informed by NHS England that the 8am-8pm walk in service is to be disaggregated from the service for registered patients at the Barkantine Health Centre. This is because the commissioning of the walk in service became the responsibility of the clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) in April 2013.
We are assured that there will be an extensive engagement process undertaken with patients and key stakeholders. Tower Hamlets CCG will be responsible for the process and future decisions concerning the location and design of walk-in services.
The expectation is that the disaggregation of the contract should take place at the first available opportunity i.e. at the point a contract has a break clause.
Asked by: Jim Fitzpatrick (Labour - Poplar and Limehouse)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many GP practices with 10-year contracts with NHS England have had those contracts (a) terminated and (b) renegotiated after five years of operation.
Answered by Jane Ellison
This information is not held or collected centrally.
Asked by: Jim Fitzpatrick (Labour - Poplar and Limehouse)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how much funding has been allocated by NHS England to piloting seven-day GP services in the North of England.
Answered by Dan Poulter
NHS England has advised that £12,055,000 has been allocated for 2014-15 across seven pilots in the North of England as part of the Prime Minister’s Challenge Fund to look at ways of improving access to GP services, including longer opening hours on weekdays and weekends.
Asked by: Jim Fitzpatrick (Labour - Poplar and Limehouse)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many GP practices are currently operating services for patients from 8am to 8pm, seven days a week.
Answered by Dan Poulter
NHS England has advised that data on the number of GP practices operating services for patients from 8am to 8pm, seven days a week is not collected centrally.
Asked by: Jim Fitzpatrick (Labour - Poplar and Limehouse)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what information his Department holds on the quantum of premature death in the UK caused by the emission of wood smoke; and whether he plans to publish that information.
Answered by Jane Ellison
Figures for premature death in the United Kingdom caused by the emission of wood smoke are not calculated and the Department has no plans to do so.
The Committee on the Medical Effects of Air Pollutants (COMEAP) has considered the wider issue of the potency of particulate matter from different sources in causing adverse effects on health. This work included consideration of evidence on biomass combustion. COMEAP’s current view (as published in reports in 2009 and 2010) is that particulate matter measured as PM2.5 is the most appropriate measure of air pollution for estimating the impact on mortality of long-term exposure to air pollution in the UK. COMEAP believes that the available evidence does not make it possible to distinguish with confidence between the effects of the different components of the ambient air pollution mixture, nor of different sources.
COMEAP’s reports are available at:
www.comeap.org.uk/documents/reports
Wood smoke is a small contributor to the overall level of PM2.5, which is mainly related to traffic and industry emissions.
Asked by: Jim Fitzpatrick (Labour - Poplar and Limehouse)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to implement a national screening plan for HIV.
Answered by Jane Ellison
Recommendations for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) screening and testing are made by a number of bodies including Public Health England, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), the UK Chief Medical Officer’s Expert Advisory Group on AIDS, the UK National Screening Committee (UKNSC), and professional organisations such as the British HIV Association and the British Association for Sexual Health and HIV.
At present there is a national antenatal screening programme which offers screening to all pregnant women. NICE guidelines for groups at increased risk of HIV include a recommendation on HIV testing in primary and secondary care in areas of higher prevalence. In addition, HIV testing is offered to all attendees of genitourinary medicine clinics.
The UKNSC is commissioning a review of the evidence for a universal screening programme in adults. The Committee hopes to be in a position to consult on the review in early 2015. In addition, NICE is in the process of reviewing its guidance relating to testing in men who have sex with men and black African communities.