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17 May 2004 : Column 815W—continued
Patients Forums
Mr. Burstow: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what steps are being taken by the Commission for Public Patient Involvement to ensure that (a) residents and (b) patients can find the names of members of local patients' forums. [172522]
Ms Rosie Winterton: Any member of the public can contact their local patients' forum through the forum support organisations (FSO); their details are on the Commission for Patient and Public Involvement in Health website at www.cppih.org.
Names of individual members are made available to the primary care trust and national health service trust that the patients' forum is working with, in accordance with the Data Protection Act 1998 requirements.
Individual members' names are not currently widely available to the public for technical reasons linked to the Data Protection Act. The Commission is, however, working with all forums to enable wide availability of members' names.
Prescriptions
Mr. Clapham: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many pharmacy and general practitioner prescribing projects are operating; how many people they cover; and what assessment he has made of their (a) influence on the numbers of people seeking treatment and (b) impact on the level of crime. [168722]
Miss Melanie Johnson: The Department does not centrally collect numbers of general practitioner prescribing projects.
Geraldine Smith: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what assessment he has made of the numbers of patients who fail to get prescriptions dispensed because of the charges. [165410]
Ms Rosie Winterton:
The number of prescription items dispensed in the community is recorded centrally but no information is held centrally about the number of items prescribed. We have not, therefore, made any
17 May 2004 : Column 816W
assessment of the number of items which might be prescribed but not dispensed. However, in 2002 only 14 per cent. of prescriptions dispensed in the community attracted a charge.
Prisoners
Vera Baird: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what alternative therapeutic environments are available to treat women who are sent to prison who are mentally ill. [172610]
Dr. Ladyman: Specialist services for people with mental health problems who come into contact with the criminal justice system are provided by multidisciplinary teams working in in-patient settings and in the community. The Department supports a range of police and court diversion and liaison schemes that enable the early diversion of such people to specialist mental health services. The courts have a number of psychiatric disposals available to them, ranging from a hospital order requiring detention in a psychiatric hospital to probation order with a condition requiring an offender to have psychiatric treatment. In addition, women prisoners assessed as needing in-patient treatment for mental disorder may be transferred to hospital.
Prosthetics/Orthodontics
Mr. Oaten: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what action is being taken to train more people in (a) prosthetics and (b) orthodontics. [172396]
Mr. Hutton: The number of training places in prosthetics and orthodontics has increased from 28 to 30 between 1996–97 and 2002–03 and the workforce review team annually reviews the need for increases in training for all the allied health professions.
Information on the number of consultants and doctors in training in orthodontics is shown in the table. The Department has centrally funded two more training posts in orthodontics in 2004–05, bringing the total training posts in place to 31. The number of dentists electing to train in specialties like orthodontics is related to the number of undergraduates training as dentists relative to the demand for dental care. We have recently completed the first review of the dental workforce since 1987 and will shortly be announcing the results including the implications for the intake of undergraduates to dental schools in England.
| 1997 | 1998 | 1999 | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | December 2003 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All staff | 509 | 501 | 504 | 513 | 506 | 508 | 522 | n/a |
| Of which: | ||||||||
| Consultant | 153 | 153 | 157 | 161 | 154 | 161 | 178 | 176 |
| Doctors in training | 110 | 120 | 117 | 101 | 115 | 130 | 118 | n/a |
n/a = Not applicable.
(43) Data at 30 September 1997 to 2003 and 31 December 2003.
Note:
December 2003 data has been taken from the mini census which collected consultants only.
Source:
Department of Health medical and dental workforce census.
17 May 2004 : Column 817W
Provigil (Modafinil)
Tim Loughton: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many prescriptions of provigil (modafinil) have been made for children in each of the last five years. [172586]
Ms Rosie Winterton [holding answer 11 May 2004]: In each of the last five years, it is estimated that under 1,000 prescription items of modafinil were dispensed in the community to children.
Rheumatological/Musculoskeletal Conditions
Andy King: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what advice and guidance is provided as part of the expert patients programme to patients with musculoskeletal conditions. [171932]
Miss Melanie Johnson: The expert patients programme (EPP) provides generic, lay-led, group based training for people in the self management of their long term condition. The programme is aimed at a wide range of people from different long term conditions and age groups, geographical location and ethnicity. The EPP is delivered locally by a network of trainers and volunteer tutors with long term conditions.
The EPP is a generic course and teaches five core self-management skills: problem solving; decision making; resource utilisation; developing effective partnerships with healthcare providers and taking action. The programme offers a tool-kit of fundamental techniques that patients can undertake to improve the quality of their life living with a long-term condition.
The course enables patients to develop their communication skills, manage their emotions, manage daily activities, interact with the healthcare system, find health resources, plan for the future, understand exercising and healthy eating, and manage fatigue, sleep, pain, anger and depression.
No specific medical advice is given to people with musculoskeletal conditions, the course aims to develop confidence and self control and does not concentrate on the physiological symptoms of the disease.
Andy King: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many extended scope physiotherapists are working in the NHS; and what steps are being taken to increase this number. [171934]
Mr. Hutton: Information is not collected separately on the number of extended scope physiotherapists employed in the national health service. As at September 2003, there were 17,922 physiotherapists employed in the NHS, an increase of 3,679 or 26 per cent., since 1997.
The Government have implemented a range of measures to recruit more health care professionals, including physiotherapists. These include improving pay and conditions, encouraging the NHS to become a better, more flexible and diverse employer, increasing training, investing in child care and continuing professional development, attracting back returners and running national and international recruitment campaigns.
17 May 2004 : Column 818W
School Nurses
Mrs. Brooke: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what plans he has to increase the number of school nurses. [170370]
Mr. Hutton: Information is not available on the number of school nurses employed in the national health service. The Government collected information on the school nursing workforce in the September 2003 non-medical workforce census but this information was incomplete. Reliable information will be available from the September 2004 workforce census.
School nurses are largely employed by primary care trusts (PCTs), and it is for PCTs and care trusts to continue to assess the level of need for school nurses in the context of wider initiatives which impact on the delivery of health services to school age children. These include a review of the nursing, midwifery and health visiting contribution to vulnerable children and young people by the Chief Nursing Officer, the development of the national service framework for children and the work arising from the green paper on children including the development of a workforce strategy covering a range of staff working with children and young people.
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