Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the clinical rationale is for NHS England's proposal to decommission dialysis as a specialised service.

The Prescribed Specialised Services Advisory Group (PSSAG) is a Department of Health appointed expert committee which was established in 2013 to provide the Secretary of State with advice and recommendations on Specialised Services. PSSAG meets multiple times a year. PSSAG met and formulated its recommendations on 30 September 2014. PSSAG felt that renal dialysis services no longer met the criteria for specialised commissioning and the responsibility for commissioning the service should be transferred to clinical commissioning groups (CCGs).

NHS England has advised that they are in dialogue with key stakeholders about both the opportunities and challenges of transferring responsibility for renal services. The head of the Specialised Services Task Force in NHS England recently met stakeholders from renal service representative groups and heard their concerns directly. A new Task & Finish group is being established by NHS England through the NHS Commissioning Assembly. This group will look specifically at what support CCGs would require to be able to safely and effectively commission services devolved to them.

The Department has launched a public consultation to consider how to transfer commissioning responsibility and what would need to happen to ensure a smooth transition and maintain both service standards and patient safety. This consultation closes on 9 January 2015.

NHS England is committed to issuing commissioning guidance for the safe transfer of services from national NHS England responsibility to local CCG responsibility.