Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to ensure that deaf people are able to access appropriate, specialist mental health services.
NHS England commissions specialised mental health services for children, young people and adults who are deaf. These include inpatient and outreach services for children and young people and services for adults who require inpatient care, including care in secure mental health services.
Access to services is based on a clinical assessment of need and conducted with the support and involvement of clinicians, including consultant psychiatrists and mental health nurses, with the skills and experience of working with deaf people with mental illness and are able to communicate using British Sign Language where needed.
To further develop these services, the Specialised Mental Health Clinical Reference Group provides advice and support to NHS England about improving commissioning, including through service specifications and quality schemes.