Children’s Heart Surgery Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department of Health and Social Care
John Denham
Main Page: John Denham (Labour - Southampton, Itchen)Department Debates - View all John Denham's debates with the Department of Health and Social Care
(10 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Hunt
Patient choice is very important, but it is also fair to say that there are other considerations in such a review, such as clinical best practice and what outcomes will get the best results for children. We need to be up front with the public that that will not mean specialist children’s heart surgery being offered in every major city in this country. There will be some difficult decisions at the end of the process. The broader point about patient choice, when it comes to considering mortality rates, is that it ties in very well with the concept of peer review. The way we can get better outcomes for children is by being able to compare what happens in different centres, and that is a very important part of the process.
Mr John Denham (Southampton, Itchen) (Lab)
Will the Secretary of State acknowledge one fact that has complicated this process? A foundation trust that loses children’s heart surgery will probably lose paediatric intensive care and, therefore, all the rest of its paediatric service activities, doing potentially catastrophic damage to the budgets of some trusts. Are the institutional pressures on individual trusts not one reason why it has been so hard to get a collaborative approach to that fundamental change? How does the Secretary of State intend to resolve that issue as he moves forward with the review?
Mr Hunt
The independent review says that the knock-on effects on adult heart surgery, and the interrelationship between the two, need to be considered. There are always knock-on effects of a service reconfiguration. Within reason, one must consider them, but one must also bear in mind what the right hon. Member for Leigh said: one must ensure that one does not overcomplicate the reviews. If we consider every single knock-on effect of every single change, the danger is that we end up not being able to change anything at all, which on this occasion would be an abdication of our important responsibilities.