Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Fleetwood)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent estimate he has made of the number and proportion of children who are living with a long-term health condition.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
This information is not collected centrally.
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Fleetwood)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking (a) with the Secretary of State for Education and (b) through the Major Conditions Strategy to improve support for children with health conditions in schools.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The early years, childhood and adolescence present an opportunity for prevention of later onset of the major conditions. Babies, children, and young people both experience the major conditions directly and are impacted through indirect experience when someone in their household has one or more conditions.
We are engaging across Government and with wider stakeholders representing babies, children, and young people to ensure their views are considered in the development of the strategy.
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Fleetwood)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to help support young people with arthritis to transition from child to adult health services.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
To support young people with arthritis transitioning from child to adult health services, each integrated care board (ICB) has an Executive Lead for Children and Young People. This lead is responsible for ensuring the functions of their ICBs work in the best interests of children and young people, including those with arthritis.
As set out in the Long Term Plan, NHS England is working to ensure that no child or young person will be lost in the gaps between children’s and adults’ services. In addition, the National Institute of Health and Care Excellence has produced guidance for healthcare practitioners and commissioners to support young people with cerebral palsy during their transition from children to adult’s services. Specific recommendations include clear pathways for transition and a named support worker.
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Fleetwood)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make an assessment of the adequacy of NHS (a) IT systems and (b) storage systems for patient letters.
Answered by Will Quince
We have set out our plans in ‘A Plan for Digital Health and Care’ in June 2022 to update and improve technology efficiency and efficacy in the National Health Service, including plans to digitise the frontline of the NHS and improve services for patients and staff. Further detail is also set out in the ‘Data Saves Lives’ strategy, and in the annual business plans for both the Department and NHS England.
More specifically, NHS IT capability in England is being measured and tracked through an annual digital maturity assessment designed to support trusts to understand their digital and data maturity and develop plans to meet our digitisation standards. This was carried out for the first time in 2023.
Additionally, NHS England does not have plans to make an assessment on the adequacy of NHS storage systems for patient letters. NHS service providers are responsible for arrangements on storing patient letters.
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Fleetwood)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he has plans to improve access to NHS dentistry in Lancaster and Fleetwood constituency.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
Our Dentistry Recovery Plan will build upon the first package of reforms agreed in July 2022, which included changes to banding and the introduction of a minimum Units of Dental Activity value. Our plan will include addressing how we continue to improve access, particularly for new patients, and how we make National Health Service work more attractive to ensure dentists are incentivised to deliver NHS care.
In Lancaster and Fleetwood constituency, the local integrated care board is currently working on a dental access and oral health improvement programme, which aims to address the current challenges facing NHS dental services.
The dental access and oral health improvement programme recognises that prevention is key to keep the population orally healthy and targets resources at those facing the greatest health inequalities.
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Fleetwood)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent progress he has made towards its target of an adult smoking prevalence of 5% or less by 2030.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
Smoking rates in England have been consistently falling and are currently at the lowest rate on record at 12.7%, based on 2022 data.
The Government remains firmly committed to the ambition of England being Smokefree by 2030, namely a smoking prevalence of 5% or less, and recognises that progress must be accelerated to meet this bold ambition. On 4 October 2023, the Prime Minister unveiled plans to introduce a new law to stop children who turn 14 this year or younger from ever legally being sold cigarettes, in a bid to create the first ‘smokefree generation’. This announcement was accompanied with additional funding including £70 million extra per year to fund local stop smoking services and £5 million this year and then £15 million per year thereafter to fund national stop smoking marketing campaigns.
This is in addition to a range of other measures which we announced in April 2023. The measures included a new national swap to stop scheme to provide vapes to one million smokers to help them to quit, and an evidence-based financial incentives scheme to help all pregnant smokers to quit.
We are confident that these new measures, in addition to the actions we are already taking, will set us on course to achieve our Smokefree 2030 ambition. We will continue to monitor progress.
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Fleetwood)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Written Statement of 11 April 2023 on Achieving Smokefree 2030: cutting smoking and stopping kids vaping, HCWS710, what modelling his Department has undertaken on how the steps outlined in that statement will help bring smoking rates down to 5% or less in England by 2030.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
Annex 1 of ‘Stopping the start: our new plan to create a smokefree generation’ sets out the modelling used to forecast changes in smoking prevalence over time based on legislating for a smokefree generation. This modelling is preliminary and will continue to be further refined ahead of publication of a full impact assessment.
Annex 1 is available at the following link:
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Fleetwood)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Answer of 27 January 2021 to Question 137239 on Prescription Drugs, what information his Department holds on the number of unique patients who have been prescribed drugs categorised under the drug groups (a) benzodiazepines including clonazepam, (b) z-drugs, (c) antidepressants and (d) opioids in the each of the last two years.
Answered by Will Quince
The methodologies used by the NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) for calculating these statistics have changed since January 2021. Therefore, the below tables include data for each of the last five financial years to address the additional two-year datasets requested as well as reflect the new methodologies used.
The following table shows the number of unique patients who were prescribed benzodiazepines including clonazepam in each financial year 2018/2019 to 2022/2023:
Financial Year | Total number of unique identified patients - benzodiazepines including clonazepam | Percentage (%) of items where the patient has been identified |
2018/2019 | 1,545,014 | 95.27 |
2019/2020 | 1,497,077 | 95.97 |
2020/2021 | 1,368,092 | 97.16 |
2021/2022 | 1,339,417 | 97.23 |
2022/2023 | 1,324,792 | 97.21 |
The following table shows the number of unique patients who were prescribed Z-Drugs in each financial year from 2018/2019 to 2021/2022:
Financial Year | Total number of unique identified patients – Z-Drugs | Percentage (%) of items where the patient has been identified |
2018/2019 | 945,510 | 96.65 |
2019/2020 | 897,451 | 96.94 |
2020/2021 | 876,746 | 98.05 |
2021/2022 | 825,382 | 98.12 |
The following table shows the number of unique patients who were prescribed an antidepressant in each financial year from 2018/2019 to 2022/2023:
Financial Year | Total number of unique identified patients – Antidepressants | Percentage (%) of items where the patient has been identified |
2018/2019 | 7,590,802 | 97.92 |
2019/2020 | 7,856,297 | 98.21 |
2020/2021 | 7,909,516 | 99.10 |
2021/2022 | 8,359,838 | 99.14 |
2022/2023 | 8,563,148 | 99.16 |
The following table shows the number of unique patients who were prescribed opioids from financial year 2018/2019 to 2021/2022:
Financial Year | Total number of unique identified patients - Opioids (includes compound analgesics) | Percentage (%) of items where the patient has been identified | Total number of unique identified patients - Opioid Analgesics (excludes compound analgesics) |
2018/2019 | 5,935,454 | 96.65 | 3,036,777 |
2019/2020 | 5,730,095 | 96.94 | 2,971,092 |
2020/2021 | 5,525,899 | 98.05 | 2,883,897 |
2021/2022 | 5,589,348 | 98.12 | 2,927,983 |
Note: Our reply to the previous question predated the official statistics used here, and used a different classification of opioids using the standard classification used in the NHSBSA Data Warehouse. Comparable data is shown in the final column of the above table; this counts patients without including any prescriptions for compound analgesics such as co-codamol and co-dydramol.
All figures included above are correct as of 5 September 2023 and could be subject to revision once audited reports are published.
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Fleetwood)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department is taking steps to reduce the use of out-of-area placements for young people in mental health inpatient services.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
We recognise that for some children and young people, mental health inpatient services, will not be the most appropriate or practical way to meet their needs. The National Health Service’s overall strategy is therefore to reduce reliance on inpatient mental health beds and out-of-area placements for children and young people with serious mental illnesses.
The model of provision of NHS-funded inpatient treatment for children and young people is being reviewed and re-designed to support the move to a community-based provision, where children and young people can access appropriate support in a timely, effective, and patient-centred way, close to home and in the least restrictive environment.
This transition is being supported by the introduction of provider collaboratives to support place-based commissioning and to develop local services that meet the needs of their communities. Options may include increased day provision and the new model will see a change to how inpatient environments are best utilised.
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Fleetwood)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to ensure NHS mental health workforce staff pay keeps pace with other sectors.
Answered by Will Quince
The National Health Service mental health workforce is made up of various professions. Staff on the national Agenda for Change contract, including nurses, midwives, and admin and clerical staff, are job evaluated. The Job Evaluation Scheme compares job demands and seeks to ensure that staff receive equal pay for work of equal value.
For medical staff, including doctors, there are separate national pay scales for basic pay which apply to each NHS medical workforce. However, the terms and conditions of service for each medical staff group do recognise and make provisions for the unsocial nature of work done in premium time, namely evenings, nights, and weekends, and this can lead to differences in pay by specialty due to different working patterns.