Tag: Lord Hunt of Kings Heath

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-10-20.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what guidance they and the NHS 111 service give to qualified nurses about the prioritisation of complex cases and more routine calls, in the light of the targets set for that service.

Lord Prior of Brampton

The Government has seen successes with the NHS 111 service since its launch, with over a million calls offered to the NHS 111 service in August, of which 93.6% were answered within 60 seconds.

The Government expects all NHS 111 centres to be appropriately staffed to offer people safe care and advice and treatment at all times and has asked NHS England for assurances that the NHS 111 service is doing all it can to help patients. Furthermore the Care Quality Commission has announced it will inspect and rate NHS 111 services by September 2016 to give additional assurances that minimum levels of quality are attained.

New Commissioning Standards for Integrated Urgent Care were published last week by NHS England. Developed jointly with commissioners and providers, the Commissioning Standards will support the transformation of urgent care services; introducing the clinical hub employing a broader range of clinical skills, direct booking into general practitioner appointments, improved clinical governance and staff development amongst other developments. Commissioners will now complete their plans to achieve the Commissioning Standards. A copy is attached.

The commissioning of NHS 111 services is led by local Clinical Commissioning Groups and the safety and effectiveness of NHS 111 services are subject to constant review by local commissioners, monitoring performance and investigating complaints and clinical incidents through existing clinical governance arrangements.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-10-20.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what response they plan to make to the recent article published in the Journal of Public Health reporting on the costs and benefits of health checks for 40 to 74 year olds.

Lord Prior of Brampton

Public Health England (PHE) provided a response to Capewell et al’s article on NHS Health Check, which appeared in the same issue of the Journal of Public Health.PHE’s Chief Executive also responded in letters published in the Guardian and the British Medical Journal (BMJ), and through a special e-bulletin to NHS Health Check stakeholders. Copies of the article and responses have been placed in the Library.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-10-20.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what consideration they have given to the assessment by Monitor that the capping of agency staff rates could result in a shortage of staff working for the National Health Service.

Lord Prior of Brampton

Price caps for agency staff: proposed roles and consultation was published by the NHS Trust Development Authority (TDA) and Monitor on 15 October 2015. A copy has been attached. The aim of the price caps is to reduce spending on agency staff and to bring the pay of agency workers in line with those of substantive staff employed in the NHS.

The NHS TDA and Monitor are currently consulting on these proposals. Any decision on introducing price caps will be subject to the results of the consultation.

The proposed price caps do include mechanisms that enable an overriding of the rules should there be any potential compromise to patient safety.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government when they will announce their response to the consultation on changes to the NHS tariff objection mechanism.

Lord Prior of Brampton

The Government’s response to the consultation ‘Fair and transparent pricing for NHS services: A consultation on proposals for revising the objection mechanism to the pricing method’ will be published shortly.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the latest date by which they need to amend secondary legislation to change the NHS tariff objection mechanism in order for such changes to operate for the setting of the 2016–17 tariff.

Lord Prior of Brampton

The objection mechanism is part of the provisions relating to statutory consultation by Monitor on proposals for a new or revised national tariff. We anticipate that Monitor will start statutory consultation on 2016-17 national tariff proposals in January. Accordingly any regulations making amended provision for the objection mechanism before that consultation starts would need to be made and brought into force no later than January 2016.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress they have made in meeting their target of collecting and sequencing 100,000 human genomes by 2017.

Lord Prior of Brampton

Almost 10,000 people have been involved in the 100,000 Genomes Project so far,with more joining through the NHS Genomic Medicine Centres each day.The Project will sequence 100,000 whole genomes from around 70,000 people.Cancer patients have their genome and the genome of their cancer sequenced. Rare disease patients have their genome sequenced as do two of their blood relatives.

As at 12 October 5,234 whole genomes had been sequenced and added to the data centre.Substantial progress has been made across all aims of the project including the establishment of 11 NHS Genomics Medicine Centres who are actively recruiting participants and the first rare disease patients being diagnosed.

Regular updates on the 100,000 Genomes Project including the total number of genomes sequenced are published on Genomics England’s website:

www.genomicsengland.co.uk

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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many people have so far been involved since recruitment into the 100,000 Genomes Project began.

Lord Prior of Brampton

Almost 10,000 people have been involved in the 100,000 Genomes Project so far,with more joining through the NHS Genomic Medicine Centres each day.The Project will sequence 100,000 whole genomes from around 70,000 people.Cancer patients have their genome and the genome of their cancer sequenced. Rare disease patients have their genome sequenced as do two of their blood relatives.

As at 12 October 5,234 whole genomes had been sequenced and added to the data centre.Substantial progress has been made across all aims of the project including the establishment of 11 NHS Genomics Medicine Centres who are actively recruiting participants and the first rare disease patients being diagnosed.

Regular updates on the 100,000 Genomes Project including the total number of genomes sequenced are published on Genomics England’s website:

www.genomicsengland.co.uk

“

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government when they will report on progress with the 100,000 Genomes Project.

Lord Prior of Brampton

Almost 10,000 people have been involved in the 100,000 Genomes Project so far,with more joining through the NHS Genomic Medicine Centres each day.The Project will sequence 100,000 whole genomes from around 70,000 people.Cancer patients have their genome and the genome of their cancer sequenced. Rare disease patients have their genome sequenced as do two of their blood relatives.

As at 12 October 5,234 whole genomes had been sequenced and added to the data centre.Substantial progress has been made across all aims of the project including the establishment of 11 NHS Genomics Medicine Centres who are actively recruiting participants and the first rare disease patients being diagnosed.

Regular updates on the 100,000 Genomes Project including the total number of genomes sequenced are published on Genomics England’s website:

www.genomicsengland.co.uk

“

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many general practitioner practices that received funding to open at weekends and in the evening have cut back out-of-hours work due to (1) a lack of demand; and (2) a shortage of GPs; and by how much those practices have reduced their opening.

Lord Prior of Brampton

Schemes within the Prime Minister’s GP Access Fund are trialling innovative and improved general practitioner access. This includes longer opening hours – such as evening and weekend hours – but also different ways of accessing services, for example telephone and video consultations and increased use of skill mix. £175 million (including £25 million sourced from the £1 billion Infrastructure Fund) has been invested in 57 schemes over two waves, meaning that over 18 million patients (a third of the country) will have benefitted from improved access and transformational change at local level by March 2016.

The Wave One pilots have, in some cases, adjusted their approach. It is right for pilots to have done this to fit with what is found to work best for the local population.

Of the 20 Wave One pilots that initially offered extended access:

‒ 12 pilots have maintained or increased their extended access from initial mobilisation;

‒ 5 pilots have reduced their extended access by an average of 6 hours per week per scheme; and

‒ robust data was not supplied in time for three pilots, so an assessment of extended access variation cannot be made at this time.

Schemes noted that in order to meet local needs and preferences, they adjusted opening hours and redirected resources towards the end of the pilot, once the pattern of local demand was better understood. The reasons for reduction in extended access varied according to locality. They included lower than expected demand from patients, and clinical/non-clinical staff availability. Furthermore, after the process of due diligence, there was a difference for some pilots between bid contract and committed hours.

Clinical commissioning groups are looking at the evidence from the pilots necessary to secure sustainable provision which has proved beneficial for patients, local services and the profession.