Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether specific Hospital Episode Statistics codes are planned to be assigned to ventral mesh rectopexy procedures to allow clear identification and monitoring of the number of such procedures conducted.

Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) is a database containing details of all admissions, accident and emergency attendances and outpatient appointments at National Health Service hospitals in England. Procedural codes are not dictated by HES.

The OPCS Classification of Interventions and Procedures (OPCS-4) is a Fundamental Information Standard which is used by clinical coders within the NHS. There is not one single code for ventral rectopexy in OPCS-4 and therefore the procedure cannot currently be identified through a single code. However, this procedure would be assigned a code based on whether it was for internal or external rectal prolapse, rectocele, obstructive defecation or faecal incontinence.

Any member of the public can submit change requests to request changes to OPCS-4 using the NHS Digital Request Submission Portal. A request has been submitted through an NHS trust for the addition of ventral mesh rectopexy; the removal of the mesh inserted during ventral rectopexy will also be considered as part of this submission.