Found: Health and life sciences, including rural health, telemedicine , and health technology; d.

Found: The Christian Legal Centre was also involved in a judicial review of the telemedicine abortion regulations

Found: From telemedicine to remote-monitoring solutions to electronic health records (EHRs) and data-sharing

Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, whether her Department has made an estimate of the number of households with telecare devices still to transition from the public switched telephone network to the Digital Voice service.

Answered by Julia Lopez - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)

According to data from the Telecare Services Association (TSA) and Farrpoint, a digital consultancy, there are between 1.7 and 2 million telecare users in the UK; given that devices are readily available to purchase privately, we cannot provide an exact figure. Of these, the TSA estimates that c.500,000 devices are compatible with digital phone lines.

However, some analogue telecare devices may also work on digital networks. DSIT has been working with the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC) and the telecare industry to raise awareness of the migration and to encourage the testing of analogue devices on digital phone lines. BT and other providers have also set up test labs for telecare suppliers or telecare service providers to test their equipment.

Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, if she will provide financial assistance to vulnerable customers reliant on (a) monitoring and (b) emergency call services where their equipment has to be upgraded as a result of BT's digital switchover.

Answered by Julia Lopez - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)

The analogue landline network, also known as the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) is a privately owned network and the decision to replace it with digital landlines has been made by the telecoms industry. Government has no formal role in the switchover process. While BT owns the largest amount of PSTN lines, this upgrade is not just confined to that company. This migration is due to necessity, as the PSTN is old and increasingly prone to failure. Retaining customers on the PSTN would mean a significant long-term risk to individuals.

The switchover process means that certain devices and services which rely on analogue landlines, such as some telecare alarms, will need to be replaced. Upgrading these devices will ensure that they are compatible with a more secure underlying infrastructure.

Since the switchover is not led by Government, there is no designated funding available from DSIT. Where telecare devices are provided by local authorities or the NHS, these organisations will need to ensure that telecare users have compatible devices. Telecare users should contact the organisation providing their devices, to discuss what support is available to them. We also encourage concerned customers to contact their Communication Provider (such as BT or VMO2) to understand their approach to the switchover and what support is available.

Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of using the bilateral aid allocated to the Myanmar-UK Health Partnership programme to (a) support and (b) protect (i) nurses and (ii) healthcare workers targeted by the Junta regime in Myanmar.

Answered by Anne-Marie Trevelyan - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)

The UK Government remains committed to assisting nurses and healthcare workers in Myanmar. The Myanmar-UK Health Partnership has supported Myanmar health workers to establish pop-up clinics and provided crucial training to develop capacity in opposition-held areas. It supplies doctors and nurses in Myanmar with web-based learning materials and has provided more than 3,000 nurses with nursing training. The programme has also supported the provision of direct services through digital methods, such as telemedicine services. The programme is designed to ensure that Myanmar's population can access healthcare services despite access constraints, while reducing the risks to health workers.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Markham on 9 February (HL2132) where they stated that they are "inviting views from third parties on abortion statistics for England and Wales, including the future publication of abortion complications data", how they intend to (1) collect, (2) collate, (3) analyse, and (4) respond, to that data; and how they intend to share that information more widely to allow parliamentarians to scrutinise and measure the efficacy of current policy on telemedicine.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

The statistics used in the publication Complications from abortions in England are official statistics in development. In accordance with the Office for Statistics Regulation’s guidance, we have ensured that users are involved and can contribute to the future of this publication. We are currently collecting feedback via two methods: an anonymous online form; and our abortion statistics mailbox. Both are publicly advertised online, and anyone is welcome to respond.

We will collate and analyse feedback on an ongoing basis to ensure that we take account of the opinions of those using our statistics, as we develop them. Collation and analysis will be undertaken in line with the Government’s statistical standards.

Finally, the Office for Statistics Regulation advises a proportionate approach to feedback that is targeted on gathering the required information, which is why we have implemented the mentioned collection methods. The aim of these collection methods is to inform and update our abortion publications, and we do not plan on sharing this feedback externally.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the cost to the public purse was of outsourcing radiology scans to external teleradiology companies in each of the last five years.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

From the years 2018/19 to 2022/23, the National Health Service spent £1,096,083,822 on outsourcing radiology scans. Over this five-year period, 18 million outsourced radiology scans were provided, representing 7.9% of the total cost of all imaging services during this time.

The outsourcing of teleradiology scans by the NHS is used to help deliver targets on diagnostic waiting times and activity, including the diagnosis of illnesses such as cancer. Outsourcing allows the NHS to maintain important diagnostic activity whilst the Government continues to invest into building up diagnostic capacity, including through an increased number of community diagnostic centres. The following table shows the cost of outsourcing radiology scans to external teleradiology companies each year from 2018/19 to 2022/23 and in total, as well as the number of activities outsourced:

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Markham on 22 January (HL1523), whether the complication rates referenced include the treatment of women as outpatients following telemedicine abortion complications arising from home use of early medical abortion pills.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

The analysis of abortion complications data published by the Department compares Abortion Notification System (ANS) data on complications known to the abortion provider at the time of the patient’s discharge from the abortion service, and Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) inpatient admissions data on abortion complications. It is not recorded on ANS whether the complications reported required inpatient or outpatient treatment.

The analysis does not include HES data on the treatment of women as outpatients following a termination. This is because HES data completeness is considerably higher for inpatient data than outpatient and accident and emergency data. Including the incomplete outpatient data in our analysis would have produced inaccurate results for this population.

Found: For example, adopting remote consultation processes with GPs via telemedicine tools and technologies

Found: Response to COVID-19 Pandemic and Preparedness for Future Pandemics/Pandemic Like Situations: Cross-Border Telemedicine

Found: technology and organisational models in areas such as Ed-Tech, digital literacy, digital health services and telemedicine

Found: The service used telemedicine for some hospital appointments. 4.53 A PPG nurse was working towards

Found: certainly concerns that diagnosis may be delayed or negatively affected when using dermoscopes and telemedicine

Found: certainly concerns that diagnosis may be delayed or negatively affected when using dermoscopes and telemedicine

Found: The service used telemedicine for some hospital appointments. 4.53 A PPG nurse was working towards

Found: certainly concerns that diagnosis may be delayed or negatively affected when using dermoscopes and telemedicine

Found:  Where telemedicine is used for the rapid assessment of people with suspected stroke, the system

Question

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on what progress has been made towards the improvement of (a) abortion services in Scotland, in particular the provision of abortions after 20 weeks of gestation and (b) the training of abortion providers.

Answered by Minto, Jenni - Minister for Public Health and Women's Health

The Scottish Government is committed to improving access to abortion services, underpinned by aims outlined in the Women’s Health Plan. Progress has been made in particular by updating Scottish Abortion Care Providers guidance on early medical abortions in Scotland to take account of the recommendations of the March 2023 evaluation of early medical abortion at home .

One of the actions in the Women’s Health plan is working with NHS Boards to enable all women having later stage abortions to be treated in Scotland.

The Scottish Government commissioned National Services Scotland (NSS) to develop a specification to deliver abortions between 20-24 weeks gestation, for all indications, within Scotland. This options paper was discussed at the National Planning and Delivery Board.

To enable a decision on the most feasible way of delivering this, it was agreed that a short life working group should work with key groups of staff in Health Boards and bring back recommendations to the Planning and Delivery Board. Once proposals for a service model have been agreed by that Board any staff training requirements will be considered as part of that.