Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to (a) help tackle shortages across the Parkinson’s disease specialist workforce and (b) assess how current workforce shortages are impacting the delivery of multi-disciplinary care as outlined in NICE guidance; and what plans he has to increase the Parkinson’s disease specialists workforce.

We have delivered an additional two million appointments, seven months ahead of schedule. This includes operations, consultations, diagnostic tests, and treatments. These additional appointments have taken place across a number of specialities, including neurology.

Whilst no specific assessment has been made of how workforce shortages are impacting the delivery of care, there are a number of initiatives supporting service improvement and better care for patients with Parkinson’s disease in England, including the Getting It Right First Time Programme for Neurology, the RightCare Progressive Neurological Conditions Toolkit, and the Neurology Transformation Programme.

We have launched a 10-Year Health Plan to reform the National Health Service. The plan will set out a bold agenda to deliver on the three big shifts needed, to move healthcare from hospital to the community, from analogue to digital, and from treatment to prevention.

A central and core part of the 10-Year Health Plan will be our workforce and how we ensure we train and provide the staff, technology, and infrastructure the NHS needs to care for patients across our communities.