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  • Iain Wright – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Iain Wright – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Iain Wright on 2016-01-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to improve recruitment and retention of embryologists in the NHS in (a) England and (b) the North East.

    Ben Gummer

    Individual healthcare providers are responsible for ensuring that they have the right level of staffing to provide high quality care to their patients, including embryology services.

    Health Education England (HEE) was established in 2012 to ensure the National Health Service has access to the right numbers of staff, at the right time and with the right skills. In doing so, HEE works with key external stakeholders to develop its National Workforce Plan for England which sets out the number of training places it will commission in the year ahead to meet future local need.

    HEE will continue to work with its 13 Local Education and Training Boards and others to ensure that there are sufficient healthcare scientists, including embryologists, being trained to meet the future needs of patients.

    Currently HEE has 28 reproductive scientists in training (which includes embryology) and are planning a further 11 to start in 2016/17. It takes three years to train a reproductive scientist.

    The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority have advised that it is not aware of any issues concerning the availability of embryologists in the United Kingdom.

  • Ian Murray – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Ian Murray – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ian Murray on 2016-01-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many da Vinci surgical systems for use in the treatment of prostate cancer are in operation in the NHS in England.

    Jane Ellison

    Data on the number of da Vinci systems for treating prostate cancer, in operation across the National Health Service in England, is not routinely collected or held centrally.

  • Helen Jones – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Helen Jones – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Helen Jones on 2016-01-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the potential effect of the removal of bursaries for nurse training on the diversity of the workforce; and if he will place in the Library a copy of the evidence used in making that assessment.

    Ben Gummer

    The Department plans to issue a public consultation around the end of February 2016. An Equality Impact Assessment will be published alongside the consultation document.

  • Helen Jones – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Helen Jones – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Helen Jones on 2016-01-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many nurse training places were available in England in each year from 2009 to 2015.

    Ben Gummer

    The following table shows the number of pre-registration nurse training places that were available for each year since 2009.

    Nursing

    2009/10

    2010/11

    2011/12

    2012/13

    2013/14

    2014/15

    2015/16

    Planned

    21,337

    20,327

    18,069

    17,546

    18,056

    19,206

    20,033

    Source: multi professional education and training budget monitoring returns

    Health Education England will formally publish the 2016/17 National Workforce Plan for England in February 2016, this document will include confirmation of the proposed increase in nursing commissions.

  • Andrew Gwynne – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Andrew Gwynne – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-01-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many times the Sexual Health Forum has met in each of the last five years; what the dates were of each such meeting; and who attended each such meeting.

    Jane Ellison

    The Sexual Health and HIV Forum met 15 times between March 2011 and March 2015. The Forum was discontinued in September 2015. Details of dates of meetings and those who attended are shown in the attached document.

    Public Health England is considering how to take forward appropriate stakeholder relationships in the future.

  • Gregory Campbell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Gregory Campbell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gregory Campbell on 2016-01-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how much his Department paid to charities in 2014-15; and what criteria were used to make decisions about those payments.

    George Freeman

    The Department works with charities and other voluntary sector organisations and makes grant and procurement payments to these organisations. In 2014-15, £120 million was paid to the voluntary sector. Payment data is held at voluntary sector level, as such, charities are not separately categorised within this data set. It would incur disproportionate cost to extract this subset of the information.

    Payments made through the procurement route are processed in line with Departmental processes, which are consistent with payments made to other organisations. Grant payments are made in accordance with the individual terms of the grant.

  • Catherine McKinnell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Catherine McKinnell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Catherine McKinnell on 2016-01-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many incidents of medication errors involving hospital patients with Parkinson’s disease resulting in (a) no, (b) low, (c) moderate and (d) severe harm were reported to the National Reporting and Learning System in the last quarter of 2014 and in each quarter of 2015; and which reporting organisation reported each such incident.

    Ben Gummer

    A recent search of the National Reporting Learning System was carried out of all medication incidents reported as occurring between the dates 1 October 2014 and 31 December 2015.

    This search used key word searches most likely to identify the requested incidents. The search mechanism available does not allow us to confirm that the patients involved with these incidents have Parkinson’s disease but it was focused on medication incidents involving drugs commonly used in Parkinson’s. It is possible that there are additional relevant incidents.

    The information requested is provided in the attached table.

  • Andrew Gwynne – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Andrew Gwynne – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-01-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many admissions there were to accident and emergency departments of children requiring tooth extraction in each of the last five years.

    Alistair Burt

    The information requested is not collected centrally.

  • Stephen Phillips – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Stephen Phillips – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Phillips on 2016-01-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, on how many occasions his Department has been notified by external consultants or other third parties of breaches by employees or subcontractors of those consultants of document retention or security policies relating to confidential or secure materials in each of the last two years.

    Jane Ellison

    The Department’s Security and Business Continuity team does not collect this information centrally and therefore does not hold this information.

    The Department includes terms and conditions in its contracts that require suppliers to inform us of any such breaches that may have taken place. Any occurrences would have to be reported directly to all local contract owners and to identify these would require trawling across all the Department’s branches that would incur a disproportionate cost.

  • Ian Blackford – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    Ian Blackford – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ian Blackford on 2016-01-14.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether she plans to increase tree-planting as a method of flood prevention.

    Rory Stewart

    In some places trees can slow the flow of water down stream and reduce the local impacts of floods. That is why flood risk management is one of the targeting criteria for woodland creation funded through the new Countryside Stewardship scheme. The Forestry Commission also continues to undertake research into understanding what role woodlands can play in managing flood risk.