Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that the NHS is an early adopter of innovation in regards to devices to prevent sudden cardiac death syndrome.

Data on the number of implantations of subcutaneous implantable cardiac defibrillators and implantable cardiac defibrillators which took place in 2013-14, the last year for which data is available, are set out in the attached table.

In 2013, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) produced Interventional Procedures Guidance on this technology for the prevention of sudden cardiac death, recommending that it should only be used with special arrangements for clinical governance, consent and audit or research.

NICE’s interventional procedures guidance assesses the efficacy and safety of interventional procedures, with the aim of protecting patients and helping clinicians, healthcare organisations and the National Health Service to introduce procedures appropriately. This guidance is not subject to the same statutory funding direction as NICE’s technology appraisal guidance.

The Accelerated Access Review will make recommendations to the Government on reforms to accelerate access for NHS patients to innovative medicines and medical technologies (including devices, diagnostics and digital), making this country the best place in the world to design, develop and deploy these products. This includes looking at regulation, reimbursement, assessment and uptake.