Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent representations he has received from ENT UK on the decision by NHS Hampshire and Isle of Wight Integrated Care Board to refuse all future referrals for (a) septoplasty and (b) other septal surgery, apart from exceptional cases; and what assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of this decision on the quality of life of people living with a structural nasal obstruction.

The Department has received correspondence about the NHS Hampshire and Isle of Wight Integrated Care Board’s (ICB) recent decision from ENT UK along with the British Rhinological Society, the Association of Otolaryngologists in Training, the British Society for Facial Plastic Surgery, and the patient charities SmellTaste and Sinus UK.

ICBs commission local services as part of their role in managing and improving healthcare for their populations. ICBs commission services to meet identified local needs and are responsible for planning how services will be delivered in their area. This includes making decisions about the routine procedures that are offered, based on evidence for how clinically effective they are. This means that nine clinical procedures, which have been available only in specific circumstances, will no longer be routinely funded.

Given this is an ICB policy, it would be their responsibility to undertake any impact assessments. The Clinical Professional Leadership Group leading on this clinical policy used expert guidance provided by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence and a national evidence-based interventions programme. This decision reflects the group’s commitment to prioritising interventions that deliver the greatest equity and overall benefit to the health needs of the entire population. All patients with a nasal blockage and/or deformity will be offered alternative advice and treatment, and only in exceptional cases can clinicians apply for funding for these procedures if the treatment is felt to be appropriate.