Asked by: Baroness Davies of Devonport (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to reduce disparities in access to specialist care for endometriosis.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
It is unacceptable that women can wait a long time for an endometriosis diagnosis and we are committed to improving waiting times for diagnosis and treatment so patients can get the care they need sooner.
The Renewed Women’s Health Strategy commits to speeding up diagnosis and access to treatment for conditions including endometriosis.
Clinical pathways for heavy periods and pelvic pain, which can be a sign of endometriosis, will be redesigned to reduce repeat appointments, unnecessary referrals, and long waits.
This will create roadmaps for health systems to use and adapt for local needs that will enable women to move more quickly through the system and reach the level of care they need with fewer appointments. These redesigned pathways will also help systems to transform services, plan their workforce, and consider where capacity is most usefully deployed so that hospitals can provide the specialist care they are designed to, and move more care, where appropriate, into the community.
Women with endometriosis will benefit from single points of access for gynaecology referrals and a shift away from hospital-only care towards neighbourhood and community settings.
As part of the Renewed Women's Health Strategy, we also committed to publishing an equity good practice guide to enable integrated care boards (ICBs) to better understand and reduce inequalities in heavy periods. Heavy periods are a key symptom of endometriosis, and this will enable ICBs to take targeted action to improve care and reduce disparities for women experiencing heavy periods and related gynaecological conditions.
Menstrual problems, including those caused by endometriosis, are prioritised as one of the first pathways to be delivered through community-based services and the new virtual hospital, NHS Online.
NHS Online will give people on certain pathways the choice of getting the specialist care they need from their home. It will connect patients with clinicians across the country through secure, online appointments accessed through the NHS App.
NHS Online will help to reduce patient waiting times, delivering the equivalent of up to 8.5 million appointments and assessments in its first three years, four times more than an average trust, while enhancing patient choice and control over their care.