Asked by: Philip Dunne (Conservative - Ludlow)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the recommendations made by the Commission on the Future of Surgery, published by the Royal College of Surgeons, what steps his Department is taking to ensure the (a) interoperability and (b) safe data sharing of different data systems.
Answered by Jackie Doyle-Price
On 17 October 2018, NHS Digital published the National Health Service digital, data and technology standards framework setting out key expectations for the use of data, interoperability, security and design standards within the NHS at the following link:
Specifically, it sets out that all NHS digital, data and technology services should support Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources-based application programming interfaces to enable the delivery of seamless care across organisational boundaries.
The Department has also created NHSX - a new unit dedicated to improving the technology experience within the NHS. NHSX has committed to ensure that future IT systems procured or developed by the NHS will adhere to a range of standards covering the content and format of information as well as ensuring any sharing of information meets the highest standards of safety and privacy.
Safe data sharing is vital to the health and care system. We have already put in over £60 million to improve cyber resilience in hospitals and ambulance services and we’re continuing to invest in capabilities to prevent, detect and respond to cyber-attacks in real time. In addition, all organisations that have access to NHS patient data must complete the Data Security and Protection Toolkit which includes a single set of standards to help them improve their cyber security and carry out self-assessments to measure how well they are doing, and how much they still need to do.
Asked by: Philip Dunne (Conservative - Ludlow)
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 the NHS (a) plan and purchase new surgical robotics systems and (b) ensure equitable patient access to those systems.
Answered by Seema Kennedy
Surgical robots have been used by the National Health Service since 2004 and are available for a range of treatments. It is a matter for NHS trusts and NHS foundation trusts to decide, within guidelines, what systems they will use for a given procedure, and the most appropriate way to treat any individual patient. The NHS will continue to evaluate new developments in technology, but any new system must prove its efficacy, safety and value over and above what is used currently.
Asked by: Philip Dunne (Conservative - Ludlow)
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 potential merits of embedding molecular biology, data literacy and human factors training into undergraduate and postgraduate medical curricula, as recommended by the Royal College of Surgeons’ Commission on the Future of Surgery.
Answered by Stephen Hammond
Each individual medical school sets its own undergraduate medical curriculum. The delivery of the undergraduate curriculum has to meet the standards set by the General Medical Council (GMC), who then monitor and check to make sure that these standards are maintained. Curricula for medical training are designed to develop the skills and attributes required of doctors to deal effectively with whatever is presented to them.
The standards require the curriculum to be formed in a way that allows all medical students to meet the GMC’s Outcomes for Graduates by the time they complete their medical degree, which describe knowledge, skills and behaviour they have to show as newly registered doctors. The GMC updated the Outcomes for Graduates in 2018, following extensive engagement and consultation with medical education experts. The new version, which schools have to align their curricula to by 2020, includes principles and knowledge relating to molecular biology, describing human factors principles and practice and critical appraisal and analysis of clinical data.
The curricula for postgraduate specialty training is set by the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges for foundation training, and by individual royal colleges and faculties for specialty training. The GMC approves curricula and assessment systems for each training programme.
The GMC, with input from Health Education England and the devolved administrations, is currently reviewing postgraduate curricula to ensure they reflect general professional capabilities and meet future patient and service needs. Generic professional capabilities are a high level framework of common generic outcomes and content across all postgraduate medical curricula, and this includes the requirement for doctors to demonstrate and apply basic Human Factors principles and practice at individual, team, organisational and system levels.