Asked by: Laura Kyrke-Smith (Labour - Aylesbury)
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 improve dementia care in Aylesbury constituency.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Buckinghamshire Council have stood up a new Dementia Strategic Oversight Board to deliver on local priorities that span across the Well Pathway for Dementia. These priorities include raising awareness of dementia, building up the support available in the community and encouraging timely diagnoses.
Buckinghamshire was selected as one of NHS England’s Diagnosing Advanced Dementia Mandate pilot sites. This pilot was delivered over a 12-month period starting in May 2023. The aim was to reduce the waiting list for assessment and restore the dementia diagnosis rate to pre-Covid levels. Over the course of this project, the Dementia Diagnosis Rate (DDR) has increased by 3.1% (from 56.2% in May 2023 to 59.5% in July 2024).
Buckinghamshire Council are re-commissioning the Dementia Support Service with the new provision due to start on 1st April 2025. This service offers advice, information, care and support for both those with memory concerns and a dementia diagnosis. It is being expanded to enable more residents to access the service and will provide an outreach service to engage clients that don’t usually access dementia support.
Asked by: Laura Kyrke-Smith (Labour - Aylesbury)
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 reduce waiting times for appointments at NHS gender identity clinics.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England has published a two-year action plan, which sets out how it will continue to transform and improve children and young people’s gender services. Investment in children and young people’s gender services in 2024/25 has more than doubled compared to 2023/24 and will increase further as new services are established.
In April 2024, NHS England opened two new services in the North West and London that offer a holistic clinical model, embedding multi-disciplinary teams in specialist children’s hospitals. A third new service will open in the South West later in the autumn, and a fourth in the East of England in spring of next year. NHS England is advancing towards meeting its commitment for there to be a specialist children’s gender service in every region by 2026. These new services will increase service capacity and reduce waiting lists.
NHS England has written to all children and young people on the waiting list for services, to offer them a mental health assessment. It has also rolled out a new referral pathway into children and young people gender services, which ensures that children are assessed more holistically through referral via pediatrics or children’s mental health services.
Asked by: Laura Kyrke-Smith (Labour - Aylesbury)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment he has made of the quality of care available for Type 1 diabetics with diabulimia; and if he will take steps to improve such provision.
Answered by Andrew Gwynne - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Type 1 Disordered Eating (T1DE), also referred to as diabulimia, is a relatively newly acknowledged condition. NHS England has provided funding for T1DE services across the National Health Services’ regions over the last five years, to help develop service specifications. The first nationally funded T1DE pilot services commenced in 2019 in London and the South Coast of England, latterly including Bournemouth and Portsmouth. A nationally commissioned evaluation was put in place to evidence the impact T1DE services had on patient outcomes and staff experience, and to provide analysis of the NHS costs and savings accrued in running the services.
On the basis of the positive findings from the evaluation of these initial services, and to further build the evidence base, NHS England has provided funding for a further five pilot services in Cheshire and Mersey, Norfolk and Norwich, Coventry and Warwickshire, Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland, and Humber and North Yorkshire for two years, with each pilot running until 31 March 2025.
The new services are delivering a national service specification, and the national team has partnered with the National Institute for Health and Care Research to evaluate delivery, with the intention that, subject to positive findings, integrated care systems can consider the evaluation outputs to determine future locally sustained approaches beyond the initial pump prime national support. NHS England has considered early learning from delivery of these services in the development of a proposal for a wider programme of support for patients nationally. However, our ability to take this forward will be subject to the outcome of the national spending review and confirmation of the NHS England diabetes programme budget.
Asked by: Laura Kyrke-Smith (Labour - Aylesbury)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will take steps to provide funding to cover basic costs for low-income care home users in Aylesbury constituency.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Charging, under the Care Act 2014, is based on several principles including that people should not be charged more than it is reasonably practicable for them to pay. Local authorities have discretion to implement charging policies which best meet the needs of the local populations they serve, whilst adhering to legislation and statutory guidance.
When assessing a resident’s ability to pay for care in a care home, the local authority may take most of the income and benefits that people receive into account, unless these are specifically required to be disregarded by the regulations. However, it is required to ensure that the resident retains an amount for personal expenses, the Personal Expenses Allowance (PEA), which is currently £30.15 per week. This rate is reviewed annually, and local authorities have the ability to set a higher PEA if they wish.
In addition, where a person has no income, the local authority should support the person to access any relevant state benefits or independent advocacy service.
Asked by: Laura Kyrke-Smith (Labour - Aylesbury)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he plans to take to reduce NHS waiting lists in Aylesbury constituency.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Tackling waiting lists is a key part of our Health Mission and a top priority for the Government, as we get the National Health Service back on its feet. Equality of both access to care and outcomes will be at the heart of building an NHS that is fit for the future.
We have committed to achieving the NHS Constitutional standard that 92% of patients should wait no longer than 18 weeks from Referral to Treatment by the end of this Parliament. As a first step to achieving this, we will deliver an extra 40,000 operations, scans, and appointments each week across the country, and will increase the number of computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, and other tests, that are needed to reduce elective and cancer waits.
NHS providers, including those serving the Aylesbury constituency, are focused on reducing waiting lists for planned treatment, and specifically focusing on patients waiting over 65 weeks, by the end of September.
Asked by: Laura Kyrke-Smith (Labour - Aylesbury)
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 tackle waiting lists for mental health services in Aylesbury constituency.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
People with mental health issues in the Aylesbury constituency and across the country are not getting the support or care they deserve, which is why we will fix the broken system to ensure that mental health is given the same attention and focus as physical health, so that people can be confident in accessing high quality mental health support when they need it. We will recruit an additional 8,500 mental health workers to reduce delays and provide faster treatment, which will also help ease pressure on hospitals. By cutting mental health waiting lists and intervening earlier with more timely mental health support, we can get this country back to good health.
Asked by: Laura Kyrke-Smith (Labour - Aylesbury)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Disabled Facilities Grant scheme, whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits of updating the Test of Resources in order to ensure working people with disabilities can access means-tested support.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
We recognise how important the right housing arrangements are in enabling people to live independently, and the need to support people to live in their own home wherever possible. In England, we continue to fund the locally administered Disabled Facilities Grant (DFG) which helps eligible older and disabled people on low incomes to adapt their homes, through practical changes like installing stair lifts or level access showers, to make them safe and suitable for their needs.
We continue to keep all aspects of the DFG under review. Local authorities have a significant degree of flexibility in how they deliver home adaptations funding. For example, they can publish a housing assistance policy to increase the upper limit of the grant, or remove means testing for grants costing under a certain amount.