Asked by: Tonia Antoniazzi (Labour - Gower)
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 tackle medicine shortages.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson
There are around 14,000 licensed medicines and the overwhelming majority are in good supply. However, the medicine supply chain is highly regulated, complex, and global, meaning there can sometimes be supply issues which affect the United Kingdom, along with other countries around the world.
Medicine supply problems can occur for several reasons such as manufacturing difficulties, regulatory non-compliance, access to raw materials, sudden demand spikes or distribution issues.
While it is not always possible to prevent supply issues from occurring, there is a team within the Department that has a range of well-established tools and processes to manage them when they arise, working closely with the pharmaceutical industry, the National Health Service, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency and others operating in the supply chain to help mitigate the risks to patients.
Asked by: Tonia Antoniazzi (Labour - Gower)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of the list of medical conditions which meet the criteria for a medical exemption certificate.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom
Approximately 89% of prescriptions are dispensed free of charge. People on a low income who do not qualify for an exemption from prescription charges can seek help under the NHS Low Income Scheme, which provides help with health costs on an income-related basis. For those who do not qualify for an exemption, prescription prepayment certificates (PPCs) allow people to obtain as many prescriptions as they need for a set cost. A three-monthly PPC or an annual PPC will save people money if they need four or more items in three months or 12 or more items in 12 months.
Asked by: Tonia Antoniazzi (Labour - Gower)
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 ensure data held on the proposed NHS Federated Data Platform is protected.
Answered by Will Quince
Data processes and systems within the Federated Data Platform (FDP) will need to comply with the Technology Code of Practice, Government Digital Service standards, the Department’s guide to good practice for digital and data-driven health technologies, the Data Protection Act 2018 and the United Kingdom’s General Data Protection Regulation, Information Commissioner’s Office guidance and associated regulations, standards and guidance.
To ensure that the FDP complies, the data sharing approach will consist of: a Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA) for the procurement of the FDP solution; overarching DPIA to articulate the data security and protection principles and lawful bases for deployment; purpose-specific DPIAs, which will be drafted for each use case and will go through the formal approval routes within NHS England prior to roll-out; and a legal mechanism for the sharing and processing of data, to be agreed in consultation with NHS England Information Governance and legal counsel.
The above activities will be concurrent and aligned with the procurement process to ensure data protection by design and default principles are embedded, and there is co-production of the final data sharing approach. This will ensure that the lawful basis for the data sharing is identified, and Common Law Duty of Confidentiality is adhered to for all of the use cases.
Asked by: Tonia Antoniazzi (Labour - Gower)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the average daily cost to the NHS was for a person receiving mental health support in a hospital ward owned by Cygnet Health Care in the latest period for which data is available.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
The information requested is not held centrally.
Asked by: Tonia Antoniazzi (Labour - Gower)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans his Department has to encourage the use by radiologists of UK guidelines for the management of soft tissue sarcomas, published in 2016 by Clinical Sarcoma Research.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
We have no plans to do so. As a direct commissioner of both soft tissue and bone sarcoma services, NHS England and NHS Improvement require that all commissioned providers must meet the standards contained within national service specifications and comply with associated clinical commissioning policies, which set out access to specific interventions.
Where clinicians consider that there is evidence which supports making amendments to national service standards or access policies, they are encouraged to submit proposals to NHS England and NHS Improvement.
Asked by: Tonia Antoniazzi (Labour - Gower)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans his Department has to increase the number of sarcoma cancers that have been staged to track the NHS Long Term Plan’s target of having 75 per cent of all cancers diagnosed at stage one or two by 2028.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
The ‘Help us help you’ encourages more people to consult their general practitioner if they experience symptoms which could be a sign of cancer. The current phase of the campaign focuses on the barriers to seeking advice, such as fear or anxiety, rather than on specific set symptoms. Previous phases of the campaign have included symptoms which could be indicative of sarcoma, such as abdominal discomfort or a persistent cough.
NHS England and NHS Improvement are committed to improving the completeness of staging data. The NHS England and NHS Improvement’s cancer programme is working with the National Disease Registration Service to identify trusts and tumour sites where staging data requires improvement.
Asked by: Tonia Antoniazzi (Labour - Gower)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what his strategy is for increasing public awareness of sarcoma cancer.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
The ‘Help us help you’ encourages more people to consult their general practitioner if they experience symptoms which could be a sign of cancer. The current phase of the campaign focuses on the barriers to seeking advice, such as fear or anxiety, rather than on specific set symptoms. Previous phases of the campaign have included symptoms which could be indicative of sarcoma, such as abdominal discomfort or a persistent cough.
NHS England and NHS Improvement are committed to improving the completeness of staging data. The NHS England and NHS Improvement’s cancer programme is working with the National Disease Registration Service to identify trusts and tumour sites where staging data requires improvement.
Asked by: Tonia Antoniazzi (Labour - Gower)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans he has to reduce the time taken to diagnose sarcoma cancer.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
The ‘Delivery plan for tackling the COVID-19 backlog of elective care’ details how the National Health Service will reduce the time taken to diagnose cancer, including sarcoma cancer. The plan aims to return the number of people waiting more than 62 days from an urgent referral for cancer to pre-pandemic levels by March 2023. By March 2024, 75% of patients who have been urgently referred by their general practitioner (GP) for suspected cancer will be diagnosed or have cancer ruled out within 28 days.
The NHS is raising awareness of cancer symptoms through the ‘Help us help you’ campaign and locally tailored approaches to increase the number of referrals from GPs. We are investing £2.3 billion to establish up to 160 community diagnostic centres (CDCs) by March 2025. CDCs will provide additional capacity for tests which can assist the diagnosis of sarcoma cancer, such as ultrasounds, magnetic resonance imaging and biopsies. Since July 2021, existing CDCs have provided over 650,000 additional tests.
Those diagnosed with sarcoma and with a family history or risk factors can access genomic tests to aid early diagnosis and treatment options. There are also specialist soft tissue sarcoma cancer centres and specialist bone sarcoma centres in England. These centres accept referrals for patients with suspected diagnoses from genomics results or primary or acute care.
Asked by: Tonia Antoniazzi (Labour - Gower)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to reduce the time taken to diagnose sarcoma cancer.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
The ‘Delivery plan for tackling the COVID-19 backlog of elective care’ details how the National Health Service will reduce the time taken to diagnose cancer, including sarcoma cancer. The plan aims to return the number of people waiting more than 62 days from an urgent referral for cancer to pre-pandemic levels by March 2023. By March 2024, 75% of patients who have been urgently referred by their general practitioner (GP) for suspected cancer will be diagnosed or have cancer ruled out within 28 days.
The NHS is raising awareness of cancer symptoms through the ‘Help us help you’ campaign and locally tailored approaches to increase the number of referrals from GPs. We are investing £2.3 billion to establish up to 160 community diagnostic centres (CDCs) by March 2025. CDCs will provide additional capacity for tests which can assist the diagnosis of sarcoma cancer, such as ultrasounds, magnetic resonance imaging and biopsies. Since July 2021, existing CDCs have provided over 650,000 additional tests.
Those diagnosed with sarcoma and with a family history or risk factors can access genomic tests to aid early diagnosis and treatment options. There are also specialist soft tissue sarcoma cancer centres and specialist bone sarcoma centres in England. These centres accept referrals for patients with suspected diagnoses from genomics results or primary or acute care.