Cancer
(asked on 6th November 2014) - View Source
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps (a) his Department and (b) NHS England is taking to ensure the families of cancer patients are given the information needed to help care for them at home.
The 2014 National Cancer Patient Experience Survey (CPES), which is managed by NHS England, asked over 110,000 cancer patients across the country for their views on their care with 64% responding. Macmillan Cancer Support has published league tables constructed from the data. The tables can be found at:
My Rt. hon. Friend the Secretary of State meets with NHS England regularly and discusses a wide range of issues.
NHS England is working with NHS Improving Quality, Macmillan Cancer Support and Strategic Clinical Networks to spread good practice across hospitals providing cancer care, including how best to utilise CPES findings. Action includes:
- the launch of an NHS Improving Quality project that pairs highly-rated cancer trusts with trusts that have potential to improve;
- regional events for commissioners looking at how CPES results inform commissioning decisions around cancer patient experience;
- publication of guidance on using CPES data to drive improvement which will be sent to all Trusts who participate in the CPES.
NHS England committed in their Five Year Forward View to improving the information given to people who use services, their families and carers. This builds on NHS England’s Commitments to Carers, published in May 2014, with 37 commitments including NHS England supporting the relevant bodies in signposting carers to information and advice about available support.
NHS England also has a strand of work focusing on improving the quality, integrity and accessibility of health related information, including information targeting carers. In addition, NHS Choices holds a wide range of information relating to the support available for carers.