Obesity

(asked on 20th March 2018) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the cost effectiveness of tier 4 obesity services.


Answered by
Steve Brine Portrait
Steve Brine
This question was answered on 27th March 2018

Clinical commissioning groups have a statutory responsibility to commission services which meet the needs of their local population including access to tier 4 obesity services.

The Department has not made an assessment of the cost effectiveness of tier 4 obesity services. It is for the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) to provide national clinical guidance and advice, based on best evidence of clinical and cost effectiveness, for use of interventions, technology and devices.

To help practitioners deliver the best possible care and give people the most effective treatments NICE has produced a suite of guidance on tackling obesity including “Obesity: identification, assessment and management of overweight and obesity in children, young people and adults”, which includes access to all tiers of obesity services. This guidance is available at:

www.nice.org.uk/guidance/cg189

The Department does not hold information on the number of tier 3 obesity services commissioned by clinical commissioning groups or local authorities.

Public Health England has explored the evidence base for tier 3 weight management interventions with adults and children, which concludes that tier 3 obesity services can provide positive outcomes and support to individuals in managing severe and often complex forms of obesity. Outputs from this work are published in: “Exploring the evidence base for Tier 3 weight management interventions for adults: a systematic review” and “Exploring the evidence base for Tier 3 specialist weight management interventions for children aged 2-18 years in the UK: a rapid systematic review”. These documents are available at:

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28695579

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29228233

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