Musculoskeletal Disorders: Physiotherapy

(asked on 2nd December 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that patients with musculoskeletal health conditions can continue to access (a) NHS, (b) private and (c) voluntary sector physiotherapy during the covid-19 outbreak.


Answered by
Edward Argar Portrait
Edward Argar
Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
This question was answered on 16th December 2020

Private or voluntary sector care decisions on access to care are a matter for the individual provider as these services are independent of the Government.

For NHS services guidance has been issued by NHS England and NHS Improvement on what services should be available. The NHS England and NHS Improvement guidance on COVID-19 prioritisation within community health services, updated August 2020, sets out advice for local commissioners in prioritising the return to near normal for most of their NHS services. This includes physiotherapy. The guidance sets out that commissioners should take into account where care is urgent and where care can take place remotely or may be patient-initiated. The guidance is available at the following link:

www.england.nhs.uk/publication/implementing-phase-3-of-the-nhs-response-to-the-covid-19-pandemic/

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