Tag: Luciana Berger

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many GP practices have a mental health specialist.

Alistair Burt

This information is not held centrally.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-03-15.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to increase the skills of nurses relating to treatment of people with learning disabilities.

Ben Gummer

It is the responsibility of the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) to set the standards and outcomes for education and training and approve training curricula to ensure newly qualified nurses are equipped with the knowledge, skills and attitudes to provide high quality patient care. This includes training in awareness of learning disabilities.

Higher Education Institutions are responsible for ensuring the programmes they provide allow healthcare students to meet the outcomes set out by the NMC upon graduation.

Health Education England (HEE) has been working with NHS England and other national partners to set out a far-reaching plan to transform services for people with a learning disability, to make significant and lasting improvements to their care and lives. At present, this is particularly focused on supporting the transforming care programme and scaling and spreading the lessons learnt from engagement with fast-track sites.

The Department has commissioned Skills for Health, Skills for Care and HEE to develop a Learning Disabilities Core Skills Education and Training Framework which will be launched in May and is aimed at all health and social care workers who have not received training in learning disabilities, especially those nurses from other fields of nursing such as adult, children and mental health nurses.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-03-23.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many and what proportion of mental health trusts provide mental health services and support by female staff in female only settings; what funding is provided for such services; and what minimum standards are required for training, supervision and support for staff and volunteers providing those services.

Alistair Burt

This information is not held centrally.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-03-24.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what progress he has made on implementing recommendation 10 in the executive summary of Public Health England’s March 2015 report entitled, Public mental health leadership and workforce development framework, on building the capacity of the National Mental Health Intelligence Network.

Jane Ellison

Progress on implementing recommendation 10, which is to build the mental health intelligence capability through the National Mental Health Intelligence Network (NMHIN) can be categorised into three sections and is as follows:

1) Capacity – NMHIN increased capacity in 2015/16 through NHS England investment. This enabled recruitment to work on additional/enhanced programmes on Crisis Care and Perinatal Mental Health and the first stage of a mental health Joint Strategic Needs Assessment toolkit. NHS England have committed to continue investment in 2016/17.

2) Products – the NMHIN has enhanced mental health intelligence capability through the development of;

a) Profiling tools (i.e. new tool on Suicide Prevention; expanded tool on Severe Mental Illness and Common Mental Health Disorders; updated tools which include; Children and Young People’s Mental Health and Wellbeing) and,

b) ntelligence products (i.e. Measuring Mental Wellbeing in Children and Young People).

3) Dissemination – the NMHIN has enabled more people to use mental health intelligence through a communication and training programme that provides: routine updates on products and work programmes, training sessions on using products, online access to video and document guides, and a programme of presentations that promote products and encourages use. The Public Health England Local Intelligence Service support this programme and increasingly a range of partners request sessions.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-04-18.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 11 April 2016 to Question 32447, what steps his Department has taken to check whether all the local transformation plans have been published online.

Alistair Burt

As part of NHS England’s robust assurance process for Local Transformation Plans (LTPs) all local areas were asked to publish their LTP in an accessible format and made widely available to improve transparency. As part of its quarter three monitoring process NHS England has asked that clinical commissioning groups submit the website address on which its LTP has been published. NHS England is currently reviewing that this has happened.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-04-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 18 April 2016 to Question 33901, if he will make it his policy to collect such information in future.

Alistair Burt

The Government is committed to improving perinatal mental health services, so that women are able to access the care they need at the right time and close to home.

NHS Digital (formerly the Health and Social Care Information Centre) is starting to collect information about perinatal mental health services in the new Mental Health Services Dataset and this will increase the amount of data about women’s contact with a range of mental health services during pregnancy and in the first year after birth. We expect that some initial data on perinatal mental health will be available later this year. We will use this initial information to refine how data on perinatal mental health is collected going forward.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-04-29.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, in which 15 areas the joint training programme to support lead contacts in mental health services and schools has been tested.

Alistair Burt

The Mental Health Services and Schools Link Pilots is testing a named single point of contact in 255 schools across 22 pilot areas and in local child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS), meaning more joined up working between schools and health services. There are more pilot sites than originally proposed as NHS England had more funding available than anticipated.

This has been backed by £3 million of government funding. These areas are listed below with indications of those with more than one clinical commissioning group (CCG):

– East Riding of Yorkshire

– Bedfordshire

– Camden

– Brighton

– Gloucester

– Waltham Forest

– Walsall

– Birmingham (covering three CCGs)

– Tower Hamlets

– Chiltern (covering two CCGs)

– Hammersmith & Fulham

– Wigan

– Somerset

– Tameside and Glossop

– Salford

– Haringey

– Sunderland

– Chiltern 2 (Aylesbury Vale)

– Hampshire

– Halton

– East and North Hertfordshire

– Sheffield

– South and East Cheshire (two CCGs)

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-05-18.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, with reference to the Answer of 1 February 2016 to Question 24630, for what reasons the thematic review of how the mental health needs of children and young people in vulnerable groups have been addressed as part of the Local Transformation Plan analysis has not been published.

Alistair Burt

Over 1,300 documents have been considered as part of NHS England’s thematic review of the Local Transformation Plans to ensure they align with the Future in Mind principles to improve children and young people’s mental health. This has required time to ensure that all the thematic reviews, including the report on vulnerable groups, are in an accessible format.

NHS England is preparing for publication and the thematic reviews will be available shortly.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-06-13.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment his Department has made of the potential benefits to mental health patients of treatments offered by Care Farms.

Alistair Burt

There has not been any assessment specifically of the benefits of care farms for people with mental health illness.

However, there is much evidence on the benefit of taking part in nature-based activities and animal-assisted therapy which is known to significantly reduce stress, anxiety, depression and generally improve well-being in people with a range of mental health problems and other conditions such as dementia.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-07-18.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps he is taking to ensure that research with European research partners into mental health continues after the result of the referendum on the EU.

Joseph Johnson

The Government recognises the importance of our research base, which is why we have protected the science budget in real terms from its current level of £4.7 billion for the rest of the parliament.

The referendum result has no immediate effect on the right of researchers to apply to or participate in EU research programmes. While the UK remains a member of the EU, current EU arrangements continue unchanged. UK participants, including those researching mental health issues, can continue to apply to programmes in the usual way. The future of UK access to these programmes will be determined as part of a wider discussion with the EU.