Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what progress has been made on implementing access and waiting time standards for eating disorder services for children and young people; and what his timetable is for NHS England to begin regular publication of waiting times for those services.

NHS England monitors the number of young people who receive treatment for an eating disorder within the ‘referral to treatment’ standard timeframe as published in the evidence-base pathway for children and young people with an eating disorder available at:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/mentalhealth/cyp/eating-disorders/

These data were collected for the first time in 2016 and will be published on a quarterly basis from 11 May 2017 at a national and regional level as a minimum. The data will be published from May 2017.

Note the eating disorder ‘referral to treatment’ standard states: “By 2020, 95% of those referred for assessment or treatment for an eating disorder should receive National Institute for Health and Care Excellence concordant treatment within one week for urgent cases and within 4 weeks for every other case”.