Mental Health Services: Standards

(asked on 18th January 2022) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the adequacy of average waiting times for people diagnosed with mental health problems to receive the treatment they need.


Answered by
Gillian Keegan Portrait
Gillian Keegan
Secretary of State for Education
This question was answered on 25th January 2022

No formal assessment has been made. Waiting times are published for services where a waiting time standard is in place, which includes Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT), Early Intervention in Psychosis and Children and Young People Eating Disorders. The latest available data for October 2021 for IAPT services shows that 98.6% of those people completing treatment waited less than 18 weeks for the start of treatment, against a target of 95%; and 91.2% waited less than six weeks, against a 75% target. The latest annual data for 2020/21 shows that 98% accessed IAPT services within 18 weeks, against a 95% target; and 90% within six weeks, against a 75% target.

NHS England and NHS Improvement have consulted on the potential to introduce five new waiting time standards. This consultation closed on 1 September 2021 and the outcomes will inform a recommendation to the Government in due course. We have committed to invest at least an additional £2.3 billion a year into mental health services in England by 2023/24. This will allow an additional two million people to access timely mental health care. We are also investing an additional £500 million in 2021/22 to address waiting times for mental health services and invest in the National Health Service workforce.

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