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 expand access to the Nuss procedure for pectus excavatum cases in the South West.

NHS England has carefully reviewed the evidence to treat pectus excavatum in patients. In an interim clinical commissioning urgent policy statement, NHS England concluded that there is enough evidence to make surgical treatment available as a routine commissioning treatment option for patients of all ages with pectus excavatum resulting in very severe physiological symptoms, including for patients in the South West. The criteria for the surgery is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/PRN00394-interim-clinical-commissioning-urgent-policy-statement-pectus-surgery.pdf