Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps she is taking to ensure that her Department's assessors are aware of the symptoms of mesh injury.

The Personal Independence Payment and Work Capability Assessments are functional assessments that consider the impact of a person’s disability or health condition, rather than the condition itself. They have been developed considering the needs of people with the full range of physical, mental, and cognitive conditions.

The department has not specified that assessment suppliers (ASs) employ health professionals (HPs) who are specialists in specific conditions or impairments. Instead, the focus is on ensuring they are experts in disability analysis, focusing on the effects of health conditions and impairments on the individual’s daily life.

HPs have access to guidance and support (such as Condition Insight Reports and Continuous Professional Development modules) on how certain conditions present and how they might affect function. These were developed specifically for HPs, to enable them to gain insight into specific conditions before undertaking an assessment. They contain clinical and functional information relevant to the condition and are usually developed with relevant stakeholders, and quality assured to ensure accuracy from both a clinical and policy perspective. All HPs within the Health Assessment Advisory Service, have access to learning modules specifically relating to mesh injury/implants.

There are also opportunities for charities and organisations to engage with ASs, which include forums, to continue to foster good relationships and to help aid the understanding of how conditions may impact on daily life. We expect this engagement to continue.