Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to increase the number of patients receiving dialysis at home.

Increasing access to home therapies is a priority for NHS England, and this is reflected in its inclusion in the Renal Transformation toolkit that was published in 2023, which recommends that 20% of all patients on kidney replacement treatment should receive treatment at home.

Commissioned renal clinical networks across England have included improving access to home therapies in their work plans as per the recommendations within the toolkit. NHS England’s national team supports renal clinical networks with the implementation of home dialysis transformation.

Commissioned renal providers in England have a contractual obligation to reimburse the additional utility costs for patients who receive home haemodialysis therapy, as stipulated within the Haemodialysis to treat established renal failure performed in a patients home national service specification and the Paediatric medicine renal service specification. Reimbursement costs are managed directly between providers and patients, and therefore there is no central record of how many patients seek reimbursement. Further information on the Paediatric medicine renal service specification is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/publication/paediatric-medicine-renal-service-specification/

Renal clinical networks are working towards increasing home dialysis rates in line with the Renal Service Transformation Programme toolkit recommendations.