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  • Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-03-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what estimate he has made of the (a) number and (b) proportion of clinical commissioning groups that commission mental health services specifically for older adults.

    Alistair Burt

    No estimate has been made of the number and proportion of clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) that commission mental health services specifically for older adults. All CCGs will have a cohort of older adults for whom there is mental health services provision. In recent years there has been a trend towards ageless mental health services.

    However, one of the recommendations in the Mental Health Taskforce report The Five Year Forward View for Mental Health published by NHS England in February this year is that bespoke older adult services should be the preferred model until such time that general adult mental health services can be shown to provide age-appropriate care.

  • Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-03-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many designated health places of safety for under-18s there are in each clinical commissioning group.

    Alistair Burt

    The Department does not hold information on how many designated health places of safety for under-18s there are in each clinical commissioning group.

    The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has produced a map of the location of designated health-based places of safety in England for people detained under section 136 of the Mental Health Act. The CQC has also published a table that breaks this information down by local authority. This information can be found at the following CQC website:

    http://www.cqc.org.uk/content/map-health-based-places-safety-0#howto

    “

  • Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-03-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the potential effects of changes to training funding on the numbers of child psychotherapists training and qualifying as part of the NHS workforce.

    Ben Gummer

    In the November 2015 Spending Review, the Government announced changes to how healthcare student places will be funded. The policy intention of the reforms is to change the funding system for pre-registration undergraduate and postgraduate courses in nursing, midwifery and allied health subjects. From 1 August 2017, these courses will be funded through the standard student loans system; and will not receive Health Education England funding for tuition and students or an National Heaslth Service bursary. The changes will apply to new students only.

    Child Psychotherapists courses are not included in the policy intention for these reforms as they do not attract funding through the NHS Bursary Scheme.

  • Heidi Alexander – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Heidi Alexander – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Heidi Alexander on 2016-03-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps he is taking to improve his Department’s collection of data for secondary breast cancer.

    Jane Ellison

    Public Health England (PHE) is responsible for collecting cancer data to support national cancer registration in England and recognises the importance of collecting data on recurrent breast cancer.

    At present pilot work in acute trusts has improved the reporting for breast cancer recurrence and metastasis to the National Cancer Registration Service but the uptake has been slow and the data is not complete. Further work is being scoped by NHS England and PHE based on the recommendation in the recent Independent Cancer Taskforce report to establish robust surveillance systems to collect this data on all cancers.

    Data on the number of people diagnosed with secondary breast cancer is not currently available.

  • Heidi Alexander – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Heidi Alexander – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Heidi Alexander on 2016-03-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps he is taking to ensure that secondary breast cancer patients have access to a clinical nurse specialist as part of their care.

    Jane Ellison

    The independent Cancer Taskforce published its report, Achieving World-Class Cancer Outcomes, in July last year, recognising the importance of access to clinical nurse specialists or other key workers for patients with all types of cancer.

    NHS England is currently working with partners across the health system to determine how best to implement the recommendations of the Cancer Taskforce and has appointed Cally Palmer CBE (Chief Executive of the Royal Marsden) as National Cancer Director to lead on implementation, as well as new cancer vanguards to redesign care and patient experience. She has set up a new Cancer Transformation Board to implement the strategy, which met for the first time on 25 January. There will also be a Cancer Advisory Group, chaired by Sir Harpal Kumar, to oversee and scrutinise the work of the Transformation Board.

  • Heidi Alexander – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Heidi Alexander – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Heidi Alexander on 2016-03-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many cancer clinical nurse specialists were working in the NHS in the latest period for which figures are available.

    Ben Gummer

    The number of cancer clinical nurse specialists working in the National Health Service is not collected centrally.

    It is for local NHS organisations with their knowledge of the healthcare needs of their local population to invest in training for specialist skills and to deploy specialist nurses.

  • Heidi Alexander – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Heidi Alexander – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Heidi Alexander on 2016-03-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to ensure hospital trusts routinely collect and submit data on secondary breast cancer.

    Jane Ellison

    Public Health England (PHE) is responsible for collecting cancer data to support national cancer registration in England and recognises the importance of collecting data on recurrent breast cancer.

    At present pilot work in acute trusts has improved the reporting for breast cancer recurrence and metastasis to the National Cancer Registration Service but the uptake has been slow and the data is not complete. Further work is being scoped by NHS England and PHE based on the recommendation in the recent Independent Cancer Taskforce report to establish robust surveillance systems to collect this data on all cancers.

    Data on the number of people diagnosed with secondary breast cancer is not currently available.

  • Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-03-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many co-commissioning pilots aimed at improving clear access routes between schools and specialist mental health services have been launched in each (a) year since 2010 and (b) month of 2015-16 to date.

    Alistair Burt

    On 3 December 2015 the Education Secretary announced 22 pilot areas across the country would develop better joint working arrangements to support timely and appropriate referrals to services and implement a joint training programme for named contacts in Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services and schools.

    To take forward these actions, the Department and NHS England are working together to test the named lead approach and to trial a joint training programme for them. The training workshops element of the pilot began in November 2015 and it is expected that all of the workshops will be delivered by the middle of March 2016.

  • Nicholas Soames – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Nicholas Soames – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nicholas Soames on 2016-03-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the gap is between the number of available and required trained doctors.

    Ben Gummer

    Health Education England (HEE) is responsible for advising the Government on the total number of medical school places and for commissioning postgraduate medical education. This aims to ensure that we have a National Health Service workforce in the right numbers, with the right skills, values and behaviour to respond to the current and future needs of patients. It takes around 5 years of medical school (undergraduate) and a year of training to become a registered doctor and a further 4 to 11 years of training to specialise in General Practice or hospital specialities.

    There are currently over 50,000 doctors in training in England according to Health Education England’s Workforce Plan (2015/16) for England.

    The latest monthly workforce statistics for November 2015 published by the Health and Social Care Information Centre show that there are 106,124 full-time equivalent doctors currently employed in the NHS in England which is an increase of 10,703 (11.2%) since May 2010.

    The Department and the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) share responsibility for determining the medical and dental school undergraduate intakes in England. The Department (via HEE) is responsible for determining overall numbers, and HEFCE has responsibility for the individual distribution to medical and dental schools. Historically places have broadly ben allocated for each institution the same as the previous year, so as to keep stability in recruitment, to help institutions to plan for their intake and in order to meet the national target.

  • Nicholas Soames – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Nicholas Soames – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nicholas Soames on 2016-03-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, for what reasons St George’s Medical School is capped at 259 student doctors each year.

    Ben Gummer

    Health Education England (HEE) is responsible for advising the Government on the total number of medical school places and for commissioning postgraduate medical education. This aims to ensure that we have a National Health Service workforce in the right numbers, with the right skills, values and behaviour to respond to the current and future needs of patients. It takes around 5 years of medical school (undergraduate) and a year of training to become a registered doctor and a further 4 to 11 years of training to specialise in General Practice or hospital specialities.

    There are currently over 50,000 doctors in training in England according to Health Education England’s Workforce Plan (2015/16) for England.

    The latest monthly workforce statistics for November 2015 published by the Health and Social Care Information Centre show that there are 106,124 full-time equivalent doctors currently employed in the NHS in England which is an increase of 10,703 (11.2%) since May 2010.

    The Department and the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) share responsibility for determining the medical and dental school undergraduate intakes in England. The Department (via HEE) is responsible for determining overall numbers, and HEFCE has responsibility for the individual distribution to medical and dental schools. Historically places have broadly ben allocated for each institution the same as the previous year, so as to keep stability in recruitment, to help institutions to plan for their intake and in order to meet the national target.