Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment he has made of the adequacy of eating disorder services for children and young people in Cornwall.

Kernow Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and Cornwall Council are responsible for assessing the health needs of children and young people in Cornwall. The two organisations produced a Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) Transformation Plan in 2017 to transform the emotional wellbeing and mental health of children and young people in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly.

The THRIVE framework set out in the transformation plan has so far achieved a new alliance style contract signed between Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, Kernow Health CiC (a general practitioner community interest company) and the Royal Cornwall NHS Hospital Trust to provide a new single pathway eating disorder service. This is a new service specification, agreed by partners, to meet access and waiting time standards by 2020. Recruitment has commenced to fill posts for the service, including a lead eating disorder paediatrician to coordinate physical health assessments and local in patient care and an additional 3.4 whole time equivalent staff into the service. CAMHS transformation funds committed for the part year 2016/17 amount to £176,000.