Asked by: Paul Bristow (Conservative - Peterborough)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent steps his Department has taken to help ensure that the NHS has capacity to deal with future infection outbreaks and deliver routine elective surgery.
Answered by Edward Argar
The Department continues to provide additional funding, drive innovation, and supporting the National Health Service to deliver both the recovery of elective services and deal with future infection outbreaks and wider pressures. It is however difficult to ensure there will be no disruptions during future infection outbreaks especially over winter.
Operational plans are in place to better manage emergency care demand and capacity. It includes the largest ever seasonal flu vaccination programme over winter, COVID-19 booster vaccines for priority groups to reduce infection risk and a 10-point plan for emergency care, which includes a range of actions across urgent, primary and community care.
To deliver elective services, the department has committed £2 billion this year to start to tackle backlogs and a further £8 billion across the following three years to increase elective activity and transform services, to improve productivity and expand capacity. At the Spending Review in October 2021, we also announced £5.9 billion capital investment to further support elective recovery, diagnostics, and technology over the next three years. This investment is key to increasing capacity and productivity.
As we have throughout this pandemic, we continue to work closely with independent sector to make the most effective use of the capacity and services available, including over winter and if needed during any future outbreaks.
Asked by: Paul Bristow (Conservative - Peterborough)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department and NHS England are taking to ensure that best practice set out by the Getting It Right First Time programme in areas including orthopaedics are adopted throughout the NHS.
Answered by Edward Argar
The Getting It Right First Time (GIRFT) programme is now embedded within NHS England and NHS Improvement’s programmes to improve quality and productivity, ensuring best practice is adopted throughout the National Health Service. GIRFT practices are incorporated into the Pathway Redesign Programme and fast track surgical hubs, which are tackling waiting lists in high volume, low acuity specialties such as orthopaedics by increasing surgical productivity across the NHS.
GIRFT metrics are also used in the model hospital system, which is a digital tool that provides an overview of a trust’s opportunities to enhance productivity. This enables peers to benchmark directly against one another and identify where improved practices can be adopted across the NHS.
Asked by: Paul Bristow (Conservative - Peterborough)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he will take under the Elective Recovery Plan to ensure that new funding for tackling the backlog will reduce waiting times for hip and knee replacement operations.
Answered by Edward Argar
The Department has provided £2 billion to the National Health Service to tackle the backlog, in addition to £8 billion over the next three years to increase activity and transform elective services. Trusts are encouraged to find innovative ways to deliver elective services, including high volume, low complexity approaches including surgical hubs for hip and knee replacements. The Department is also providing a £700 million Targeted Investment Fund to enable cutting edge technologies and to increase operating theatre capacity, thereby improving productivity in hospitals.