Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the implications for his policies on the identification and management of people with Lynch syndrome are of the findings of Bowel Cancer UK's report, entitled Lynch syndrome: Who's responsible, published in February 2017.

In current NHS England commissioning practice, testing for Lynch syndrome in people with colorectal cancer is targeted using criteria based on family history and age of cancer onset to determine people at high risk.

New National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidance recommends extending this offer to all people with colorectal cancer when they are first diagnosed. Offering tests to all people with colorectal cancer will need to be considered by NHS England as part of its policy development process. Each year, a number of new drugs, medical devices, tests and treatments in specialised services are put forward to NHS England. The promising proposals are considered by experts in the field, including doctors, public health experts and lay people. These groups, established by NHS England, are known as Clinical Reference Groups (CRGs). The CRGs make detailed assessments of the new treatments, tests and devices through Policy Working Groups.

The NICE guidance has been sent to the Genetic Medicine CRG and they have been asked to submit a Preliminary Policy Proposal and to identify a Clinical Lead for progressing the proposal.

The commissioning of services for people already diagnosed with Lynch Syndrome, including surveillance, generally sits with clinical commissioning groups (CCGs). CCGs are best placed to commission services to meet the needs of local populations, taking into account the best available evidence.