NHS: Costs of Operations Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateLord Naseby
Main Page: Lord Naseby (Conservative - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Naseby's debates with the Department of Health and Social Care
(8 years, 9 months ago)
Lords Chamber
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether the National Health Service will publish the average cost of all operations and procedures undertaken (1) by general practitioners, and (2) in hospitals.
My Lords, the department has published the average cost of operations and procedures in hospitals for the past 17 financial years. These reference costs are the average unit costs to NHS hospital trusts of providing acute, ambulance, mental health and community services, covering £58 billion, or 55%, of revenue expenditure in 2013-14. Reference costs for 2014-15 will be published this month. There are currently no plans to collect similar information from general practitioners.
Does my noble friend recall that one of the features of GP fundholding was that GPs had a budget, the patient could choose what hospital they went to and the hospital to which they were referred then sent a bill to the GP? If we introduced a new system whereby GPs and hospitals actually knew the cost of what they were or should be charging, would that not enable GPs and hospitals to stick to their budgets, and some of the overspend would then disappear?
My Lords, hospitals do know their costs; they know their reference costs and their HRGs. Increasingly, we will want to get patient-level costing into all our hospitals, as is already the case in some hospitals. If you know the actual cost by patient, the hospital management can have a much better discussion with hospital clinicians. Patient-level costing is important going forward in hospitals. For GPs, we have a calculated payment, as my noble friend will know: currently £75.77 per capita on the list, adjusted for various matters. A capitated figure for GPs is probably better than a much more detailed breakdown of costs.