Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the implications for his Department's policies research carried out by Professor Kypros Nicolaides into Doppler scans and their potential to cut the number of stillbirths; and if he will make a statement.

Current National Institute for Health and Care Excellence clinical guidelines on antenatal care recommend that routine doppler ultrasound scans should not be used in low risk pregnancies.

Information on the number of National Health Service hospitals that routinely provide doppler scans to pregnant women is not collected centrally.

The UK National Screening Committee advises Ministers and the NHS in all four countries about all aspects of screening policy. The Committee’s secretariat is currently scoping an evidence review on the practicality of a screening programme for the prevention of intrauterine growth restriction and subsequent stillbirth. This is a complicated issue and the scope will address a range of approaches and tests, including that proposed by Professor Nicolaides.