Asked by: Michael Fabricant (Conservative - Lichfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether dentists will be able to return to normal working practices in (a) Step 3 or (b) Step 4 of the national covid-19 roadmap.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We are working with NHS England and NHS Improvement to increase levels of dental activity as fast as is safely possible. Contractual arrangements for the first six months of the 2021/22 financial year have been introduced by NHS England and NHS Improvement. The revised unit of dental activity threshold set at 60% is based on data that indicates practices may now have capacity to safely achieve more dental activity. Arrangements will be monitored on a monthly basis and are expected to be in place for six months in order to provide increased stability for dental practices. National Health Service commissioners have the discretion to make exceptions, for instance in cases where a dental practice has been impacted by staff being required to self-isolate.
We are working to address oral health inequalities. NHS England and NHS Improvement have provided local commissioners with a flexible commissioning toolkit to illustrate how best to use current flexibilities in commissioning to target capacity on improving access to urgent care and delivering care to high risk patient groups.
Asked by: Michael Fabricant (Conservative - Lichfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he issue guidance to dentists on when they might be expected to return to normal working.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Dentistry has been particularly affected by the risk of COVID-19 transmission due to the number of aerosol generating procedures carried out. This has resulted in the need for an enhanced level of personal protective equipment and reduced throughput to allow for thorough cleaning and resting of rooms between patients, as set out in Public Health England’s Infection Prevention and Control guidance.
The Department is working closely with NHS England and NHS Improvement and the Chief Dental Officer for England to increase levels of service, as fast as is safely possible. We have been closely monitoring what has been possible and on 29 March announced that the threshold for full National Health Service contractual payment would be raised to 60% of normal activity. We continue to explore what more can be done to increase capacity including piloting pre-appointment testing.
Asked by: Michael Fabricant (Conservative - Lichfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, further to the Answer of 3 March to Question 154738, what support his Department is providing for (a) research on and (b) trials of vaccines offering immunity to covid-19 which can be delivered by gradual absorption through the skin using an adhesive patch.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Department has not currently commissioned any research into COVID-19 vaccines which can be delivered through an adhesive patch but the National Institute for Health Research, as the biggest public funder of health research in the United Kingdom, continues to welcome funding applications for research into any aspect of human health, including on COVID-19 vaccine related research.
Asked by: Michael Fabricant (Conservative - Lichfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when an outstanding payment of £483,393 dating from July 2020 will be paid to St Giles Hospice of Whittington near Lichfield.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England and Improvement are in the process of reconciling the final payments covering July 2020 from this scheme. NHS England and NHS Improvement have not yet set a date by which final payments will be made but advise they expect the process to be completed and payments made, including any final funding due to St Giles Hospice, shortly.
Asked by: Michael Fabricant (Conservative - Lichfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what support his Department is providing for (a) research on and (b) trials of oral vaccines offering immunity to covid-19.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
Through a joint rolling research call for COVID-19 research between the National Institute for Health Research and UK Research and Innovation, funding of over £500,000 has been committed to a study looking at the safety and immunogenicity of two candidate COVID-19 vaccines administered to the respiratory tract in aerosol form, with an expected end date in August 2021.
In addition, Innovate UK, have been managing the delivery of £75 million of the £110 million Department-funded UK Vaccine Network programme. Nine Departmental projects within this portfolio were repurposed to identify other COVID-19 vaccines solutions. Also, two Innovate UK grants worth over £2.2 million in total, were awarded to Stabilitech, now known as IosBio, to assess its COVD-19 vaccine candidate that has an oral capsule delivery system in animal efficacy studies. This technology is now being tested in participants in clinical trials in South Africa and the United States.
Asked by: Michael Fabricant (Conservative - Lichfield)
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 prevent a shortfall of GPs qualifying in 2020 due to the cancellation of the postgraduate assessments (a) Applied Knowledge Test and (b) Clinical Skills Assessment, as a result of covid-19 outbreak; and what assessment he has made of the viability of using another form of such assessment during the covid-19 lock-down.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) and the four statutory education bodies are rapidly developing a temporary recorded alternative to the Clinical Skills Assessment (subject to approval by the General Medical Council). The RCGP have advised that this will provide trainees with an opportunity to demonstrate their competence to be awarded a Certificate of Completion of Training and qualify as a GP.
At the same time, the RCGP is working with their testing partner to enable the Applied Knowledge Test to resume at test centres with appropriate social distancing safeguards in place from July. The RCGP is also investigating options for remote invigilation for those who are shielding.
Asked by: Michael Fabricant (Conservative - Lichfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many student specialist dermatologists there were in each of the last 10 years for which data is available.
Answered by Stephen Hammond
The number of doctors in dermatology specialty training programmes in England is shown in the following table. Data is not available for years prior to 2012.
Number of doctors in dermatology specialty training at March of each year in England
Year in training | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 |
Number of dermatology trainees | 193 | 193 | 192 | 201 | 199 | 201 | 206 |
Source: Published General Medical Council (GMC) data
Doctors wishing to enter specialty training in the United Kingdom need to have completed an undergraduate medical degree and two years of foundation training, after which they can enter a six-year specialty training programme. This comprises of one of three two-year core training programmes (Core Medical Training, Acute Care Common Stem in Acute Medicine or Level 1 Paediatric training), followed by four years of dermatology training, and upon successful completion they can gain registration with the GMC as a specialist doctor.
The data in the table is specific to years three to six of this training pathway.
Asked by: Michael Fabricant (Conservative - Lichfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many patients were treated by consultant dermatologists for skin diseases in (a) the last 12 months for which data are available, (b) 2014 and (c) 2009.
Answered by Steve Brine
The information is unavailable in the format requested.
Asked by: Michael Fabricant (Conservative - Lichfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of the availability of professional training places for medical graduates wishing to specialise in dermatology; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Stephen Hammond
The number of medical specialty training places that are available each year is set by Health Education England (HEE) and based on their assessment of service gaps and predicted workforce needs.
Data from the HEE National Recruitment Office shows that there has been a 100% fill rate in dermatology specialty training in each of the past six years. The numbers of training places available in each year since 2013, the earliest available data, are shown in the following table.
| 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 |
Total national training numbers | 49 | 46 | 49 | 49 | 46 | 65 |
Source: ST3 recruitment website: https://www.st3recruitment.org.uk/specialties/dermatology
Note: Data includes England, Scotland and Wales
Asked by: Michael Fabricant (Conservative - Lichfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 13 February 2019 to Question 216936, for what reason NHS Blood and Transplant has not conducted paid for advertising to inform men who have sex with men of changes to blood donation rules.
Answered by Jackie Doyle-Price
During 2017/18, NHS Blood and Transplant spent £3.14 million on paid media to encourage people to donate blood. All marketing materials promote the ‘eligibility criteria tool’ which is found on the Give Blood website at the following link:
The ‘eligibility criteria tool’ lists the deferral times for a range of scenarios such as travel, medical conditions, tattoos and includes information for men who have sex with men and wish to donate blood. NHS Blood and Transplant is committed to exploring whether a more individualised approach to risk assessment could be taken to donor selection and expects to report on its findings regarding new evidence and new technologies for assessing risk by 2020. NHS Blood and Transplant has and will continue to engage with key stakeholders such as the Terrence Higgins Trust, the National Aids Trust and Stonewall about changes to eligibility criteria.