Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what progress his Department has made on the establishment of a national neurological service for the Deaf British Sign Language Community.

The Department is aware of recent work undertaken by University College London’s Deafness Cognition and Language (DCAL) research centre to develop a model for a national neurological service for the deaf. DCAL has proposed that this service would be appropriate for national commissioning by NHS England. The proposed model has been shared with NHS England, which will provide further information to support consideration of DCAL’s proposal by the Prescribed Specialised Services Advisory Group (PSSAG). Ministers are advised by PSSAG on the question of which services for rare and very rare conditions should be commissioned nationally by NHS England.

Since 1 April 2013, NHS England has been responsible for commissioning specialised neurological services at a national level. NHS England’s neurosciences service specification sets out what providers must have in place to offer specialised neurological care for all patients who need it, including deaf patients. The specification can be found at the follow link:

www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/d04-neurosci-spec-neuro.pdf