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 ensure that beds in spinal cord injury centres are prioritised for the use of people with spinal cord injuries who require specialist care in future winters.

NHS England commissions specialised spinal care from eight centres in England for patients who have suffered a spinal cord injury, totalling 374 beds. The service is managed locally and delivered by spinal cord injury specialists, both within the spinal cord injury centres and as outreach to acute hospitals and following discharge for transition and reintegration into the community.

NHS England’s national team has advised that it is not aware of any intelligence to suggest that a spinal cord injury patient has been denied a specialist bed during the winter period due to its use by a non-spinal cord injury patient.