Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what progress has been made on meeting priority 22 of the Ending Violence against Women and Girls Strategy 2016-2020, published in March 2016.

Progress continues to be made by the health sector against all three of these actions in the Violence against Women and Girls (VAWG) Action Plan.

On priority 21, discussions are ongoing between the Chief Medical Officer and relevant policy officials. A survey has been completed of domestic violence teaching in medical schools and this has been accepted for publication. Medical Royal Colleges are considering how to increase the profile of VAWG teaching at undergraduate and postgraduate level.

On priority 22, the Department produced in March 2017 an online publication, ‘Responding to Domestic Abuse – a resource for health professionals’ is available at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/domestic-abuse-a-resource-for-health-professionals

The publication calls for routine enquiry into domestic abuse to become a fundamental part of the skills and practice of every health professional. More broadly the National Health Service provides care and support to victims of domestic abuse and domestic violence through a wide range of health care services, including services for physical and mental health. Routine enquiry is already in place in maternity and mental health services, to improve earlier disclosure and support people to get the care that they need. The Department has supported the Royal College of General Practitioners to develop a Violence Against Women and Children e-learning training course for general practitioners (GPs) and other primary care professionals to improve their recognition of and response to patients suffering from violence and abuse is available at:

http://elearning.rcgp.org.uk/course/search.php?search=violence+against+women+and+children

The Identification and Referral to Improve Safety (IRIS) programme provides staff training and a support programme to bridge the gap between the voluntary sector and primary care, providing an improved domestic violence service. It is designed to encourage clinicians and administrative staff to ask clients about domestic abuse and violence and then either to react with an appropriate support, treatment and care). IRIS has been developed as a commissionable model for implementation nationally – it has been commissioned in 34 sites in England and one in Wales, where it is running in over 1,000 GPs. IRIS Advise is a further development of IRIS targeted precisely at sexual health services and has been successful in pilots in Bristol and east London.

On priority 23, the Department is working with NHS Digital to develop a work programme to support this commitment. In October 2017 NHS Digital will be submitting the Emergency Care Dataset (ECDS). This addresses an identified information gap, and will achieve substantial benefits for patients and the wider urgent care system. It will be implemented across emergency departments in England including all Type 1 Accident and Emergency (A&E) wards, and injury data will be collected as an integral part of the dataset. The introduction of ECDS should encourage consistent data collection, helping A&E wards to meet the Information Sharing to Tackle Violence standards. The new version of the Mental Health Services Dataset went live in April 2017. Discussions are ongoing regarding how mental health data can support delivery of priority 23.