Asked by: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the £645 million announced as part of the Government's delivery plan for the recovery of primary care, what progress her Department has made on its negotiations with Community Pharmacy England; and what her planned timescale is for launching the common conditions service.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Negotiations with Community Pharmacy England (CPE) have concluded, and pharmacy contractors have been informed by a joint letter from the Department, NHS England and CPE about the detail of Pharmacy First including the funding of the service. That letter has been published on gov.uk. Pharmacy First will launch on 31 January 2024, subject to the IT underpinning the service being complete. The expansion of the Pharmacy Contraception Service will launch on 1 December together with a relaunch of the existing Blood Pressure Check Service.
Under Pharmacy First, community pharmacists will be able to supply prescription-only medicines, including antibiotics and antivirals where clinically appropriate, to treat seven common health conditions (sinusitis, sore throat, earache, infected insect bite, impetigo, shingles, and uncomplicated urinary tract infections in women) without the need to visit a GP. The supply of prescription-only medicines will be under Patient Group Directions which are strict protocols for when a medicine can be supplied without a prescription. At present, there are no plans to expand the seven conditions.
Pharmacy First can be delivered remotely including by distance selling pharmacies but they will not be able to deliver the earache pathway because this requires someone to look in patient’s ear which cannot be done remotely.
Uptake and delivery of Pharmacy First will be closely monitored including the impact on antimicrobial resistance.
Asked by: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what information her Department holds on neurological outcomes for patients admitted for a cardiac arrest suffered out of hospital (a) with and (b) without defibrillator treatment at the scene.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
This data is not held by the Department.
Asked by: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when she plans to launch the consultation on the permanent extension of the Healthy Start scheme to families who are subject to No Recourse to Public Funds.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
We are currently considering options and further information will be available in due course.
Asked by: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
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 17 April 2023 to Question 177873 on Heart Diseases, what steps the NHS is taking to increase access to testing to support the diagnosis of heart failure in primary care.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The NHS Long Term Plan has committed to a number of key ambitions to improve care and outcomes for individuals with cardiovascular disease, including enhanced diagnostic support in the community, better personalised planning and increasing access to cardiac rehabilitation. These ambitions will support the delivery of the aim to help prevent 150,000 heart attacks, strokes, and dementia cases by 2029.
Cutting National Health Service waiting lists, including for cardiology services, is one of this Government’s top priorities. £2.3 billion was awarded to transform diagnostic services over the next three years to increase diagnostic capacity, including for cardiology services. This funding will also increase the number of Community Diagnostic Centres (CDCs) up to 160 by March 2025, including a number delivering cardiology services.
In addition, the NHS will increase capacity, by seeking alternative capacity in other trusts or the independent sector and increasing activity through dedicated and protected surgical hubs.
NHS England is supporting a new fast-track echocardiography training scheme. In collaboration with the British Society of Echocardiography (BSE), this training scheme has been developed to respond rapidly to the urgent workforce needs for accredited echocardiographers.
Asked by: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps her Department is taking to (a) measure and (b) assess the adequacy of the progress of integrated care systems in (i) establishing women’s health hubs and (ii) ensuring that hubs offer the full list of core services set out in the guidance entitled Women's health hubs: core specification, published on 22 July 2023.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
Every integrated care board (ICB) in England has been allocated £595,000 in total over 2023/24 and 2024/25. ICBs have been asked to use this funding to establish or expand at least one women’s health hub in their system in line with the core specification.
ICBs are accountable to NHS England (NHSE) for NHS spend and performance, including the funding for women’s health hubs. All ICBs have now submitted an initial return to NHSE setting out where their hub(s) will be, what services they plan to offer, their staffing model, and other information.
ICBs are responsible for commissioning services that meet the needs of their local population and will determine the exact services that their women’s health hub will provide. NHSE will request further updates over the duration of the funding to enable DHSC and NHSE to monitor ICBs’ progress.
Asked by: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment her Department has made of levels of regional variation in the (a) provision of and (b) funding for long-acting reversible contraception.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
There are no plans to make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing a national minimum fee for fitting long-acting reversible contraception (LARC), or to make an assessment of levels of regional variation in the provision of and funding for LARC.
Integrated care boards (ICBs) may commission General Practices to offer LARC as an enhanced service to their local population, in addition to the service provided through the GP contract. It is for ICBs to decide on commissioning arrangements for their area based on an assessment of local need.
Local authorities in England are responsible for commissioning comprehensive, open access sexual and reproductive health services, including the provision of LARC, to meet local demand.
Asked by: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing a national minimum fee for fitting long-acting reversible contraception.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
There are no plans to make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing a national minimum fee for fitting long-acting reversible contraception (LARC), or to make an assessment of levels of regional variation in the provision of and funding for LARC.
Integrated care boards (ICBs) may commission General Practices to offer LARC as an enhanced service to their local population, in addition to the service provided through the GP contract. It is for ICBs to decide on commissioning arrangements for their area based on an assessment of local need.
Local authorities in England are responsible for commissioning comprehensive, open access sexual and reproductive health services, including the provision of LARC, to meet local demand.
Asked by: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when she plans to publish the findings of the Government Champion for Personalised Prevention's taskforce on cardiovascular disease.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is considering the recommendations of the Government Champion for Personalised Prevention. There are currently no plans to publish his report.
Asked by: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether she plans to increase the specialist cardiology workforce in (a) primary and (b) secondary care.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
There are currently 3,738 full time equivalent doctors working in the specialty of cardiology in the National Health Service in England. This is 666 (21.7%) more than in 2019. Within this there are 1,653 full time equivalent consultants working in the speciality of cardiology, 278 (20.2%) more than in 2019.
The NHS Long Term Workforce Plan (LTWP), published by NHS England on 30 June 2023, sets out our aim to double the number of medical school places in England to 15,000 places a year by 2031/32. It also sets out how we will work towards this expansion by increasing places by a third, to 10,000 a year, by 2028/29. The LTWP commits to an adequate growth in foundation placement capacity, as those taking up these new places begin to graduate, and a commensurate increase in specialty training places that meets the demands of the NHS in the future. This will substantially increase the potential pipeline for the cardiologist workforce in primary and secondary care.
Asked by: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what proportion of (a) paediatric and (b) adult cystic fibrosis centres did not provide at least 85 per cent of their patients with psychological support at their annual review in (i) 2021 and (ii) 2022.
Answered by Will Quince
The information is not available in the requested format.
However, tables showing that the number of centres where the percentage of adult cystic fibrosis patients and paediatric cystic fibrosis patients seen by a clinical psychologist within 12 months prior to the latest annual review was less than 85% in 2021/2022 and 2022/2023 are displayed below.
Adult cystic fibrosis patients seen (e.g. annual review screening, in-patient or out-patient consultation) by a clinical psychologist within 12 months prior to latest annual review:
| 2021/2022 | 2022/2023 |
Centres reporting data for this indicator during the reporting period | 12 | 15 |
Number of centres reporting fewer than 85% of patients had seen a psychologist in the 12 months before their latest annual review | 7 | 10 |
Number of centres reporting that more than 85% of patients had seen a psychologist in the 12 months before their latest annual review | 5 | 5 |
Paediatric cystic fibrosis patients seen (e.g. annual review screening, in-patient or out-patient consultation) by a clinical psychologist within 12 months prior to latest annual review:
| 2021/2022 | 2022/2023 |
Centres reporting data for this indicator during the reporting period | 16 | 18 |
Number of centres reporting fewer than 85% of patients had seen a psychologist in the 12 months before their latest annual review | 11 | 14 |
Number of centres reporting that more than 85% of patients had seen a psychologist in the 12 months before their latest annual review | 5 | 4 |
Source: NHS England Specialised Services Quality Dashboard (SSQD).
SSQD reporting was stood down during the Covid pandemic between April 2020 and March 2022 which may interfere with completeness.