Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to incentivise the delivery of high quality heart failure services.

NHS England hosts a collaborative group which brings together the relevant National Clinical Directors, the main relevant national charities, the National Cardiovascular Disease (CVD) Intelligence Network, Public Health England and the Department. This collaborative group continues to work together to reduce premature mortality in both primary and secondary care settings in relation to people with, or at risk of having, CVD.

NHS England is also working with key partners to ensure better co-ordination and integration of all services with the aim of delivering person centred and coordinated care which is tailored to the needs and preferences of the individual, their carer and family. In particular, to encourage better practice in the caring for heart failure patients, NHS England has established a best practice tariff for acute heart failure. It is also working with Health Education England to explore ways of improving the provision of, and increase access to, echocardiography, which is used in the diagnosis of heart failure.

To help the National Health Service understand what a good quality service looks like, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence publish quality standards which define best practice within a topic area and it has published quality standards for acute and chronic heart failure. These can be found at:

https://www.nice.org.uk/Guidance/QS9

https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/qs103

NHS England expects commissioners and providers to take account of quality standards in the services that are delivered to patients.