Source · Select Committees · Women and Equalities Committee
Recommendation 24
24
Accepted in Part
Paragraph: 189
We commend the work undertaken by NHS England to open more gender identity clinics and...
Recommendation
We commend the work undertaken by NHS England to open more gender identity clinics and welcome the announcement of the opening of a further two pilot clinics. We are, however, concerned to learn that waiting times for these clinics continue to be lengthy. There also appears to be a lack of clarity from NHS England over whether these pilot clinics will continue to remain open long-term. We recommend that the GEO works closely with the Department for Health and Social Care and NHS England to ensure that NHS England maintain the five pilot gender identity clinics unless or until the time that more permanent facilities with greater capacity, geographical scope and powers can be established. No facility should be closed without another opening in its place to ensure waiting times are reduced. Given that NHS England has opened five pilot clinics in the last two years, the Equalities Minister should secure additional funding to ensure significant steps will be made over the next two years to reduce waiting list times. The Minister should work closely with NHS England to continue to open facilities in under-resourced areas to tackle lengthy waiting lists and provide other much needed services including mental health services. We would urge it to consider opening clinics in the West Midlands and the South West of England, given the lack of services in those regions.
Government response summary AI-generated
The government states NHSEI is committed to commissioning a new adult service model and evaluating pilot clinics to inform permanent commissioning. They are working to move services in the South West to a new model by 2023, and reference existing mental health funding and ongoing GEO collaboration with DHSC, partially addressing the geographical and service provision requests.
Summary of the government's response below — read the verbatim text to verify.
Paragraph Reference:
189
Government Response
Accepted in Part
HM Government · verbatim extract
Accepted in Part
49. NHSEI is committed to the commissioning of a new service model for adults in the future, building clinical capacity in primary care and sexual health services, to reduce waiting times. DHSC and NHSEI welcome the positive feedback and impact the pilot clinics are having for patients during the current evaluation phase. The pilot clinics have been established to understand and evidence whether these services can be delivered in new ways that produce improved outcomes for patients. It is important that they are evaluated so that assurance can be given to patients and clinicians – particularly GPs and sexual health clinicians who may be interested in specialising in this area of medicine – that the new models are clinically safe and effective. All pilots are being evaluated by an independent third party (Rocket Science, a consultancy) and this will inform the development of a new service specification against which new services can be commissioned on a permanent basis. NHSEI Regional teams, working as part of Integrated Care Systems, will use the findings to consider how to adopt them in their regions, tailored to local needs and circumstances. The process for awarding any permanent contracts would have to follow procurement regulations. NHSEI is committed to ensuring that any grounds made in reducing waiting times through the pilots are not lost in the transition to commissioning permanent new service models.
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