Tag: House of Commons Health and Social Care Committee

Covid 19

Current awareness updates

Interim Clinical Commissioning Policy: Neutralising monoclonal antibodies and intravenous antivirals in the treatment of COVID-19 in hospitalised patients.
Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC); 2021.
[This rapid policy statement from 24th December outlines the eligibility criteria for the use of casirivimab with imdevimab or sotrovimab for patients hospitalised with COVID-19, and those with hospital onset COVID-19.]

The European clinical research response to optimise treatment of patients with COVID-19: lessons learned, future perspective, and recommendations.
Goossens H. The Lancet Infectious Diseases 2021;:doi.org/10.1016/S1473-3099(21)00705-2.
[We discuss how the clinical research community responded to the pandemic in Europe, what lessons were learned, and provide recommendations for future clinical research response during pandemics. We focused on two platform trials: RECOVERY and REMAP-CAP.]

Remote general practitioner consultations during COVID-19.
Green MA. The Lancet Digital Health 2022;4(1):E7.
[[Letter.] Advances in digital technology had already stimulated debate on consultation methods; despite offering convenience for some patients, there were concerns about widening inequalities for others. Given that the pandemic offered a natural experiment to assess the potential implications of remote consultations, we analysed data from NHS Digital to better understand these implications. Our analyses showed that any suggestion that GPs were not seeing patients in person was not true.]

Delivering outpatient virtual clinics during the COVID-19 pandemic: early evaluation of clinicians’ experiences.[Abstract]
Vas V. BMJ Open Quality 2022;11(1):doi: 10.1136/bmjoq-2020-001313.
[Conclusions: In response to the pandemic, outpatient services across the trust were rapidly redesigned and virtual clinics implemented. As a result, services have been able to sustain some level of service delivery. However, clinicians have identified challenges in delivering this model of care and highlighted enablers needed to sustaining the delivery of virtual clinics longer term, such as patient access to diagnostic tests and investigations closer to home.]

CG Report 6: Effects of COVID-19 In Care Homes: A Mixed Methods Review.
Collateral Global; 2021.
[The report, using national datasets for 25 countries on mortality, provides an up-to-date review of global effects of COVID-19 pandemic in care homes, assessing care home mortality by country, how the deaths compared with previous periods, and how excess deaths may be explained.]

Regulation and use of confidential patient information for genomic and medical research during and post Covid-19.
PHG Foundation; 2021.
[At the start of the Covid-19 pandemic the government in England introduced measures to enable the use of confidential patient information for Covid-19 purposes without consent or another form of approval that would normally be required. This report considers how these regulatory changes to the governance of confidential patient information have impacted genomic and medical research, and whether these changes should be integrated into the regulatory framework longer term.]

Frequently asked questions: Demonstrating Covid-19 and vaccination status.
House of Commons Library; 2021.
[This briefing sets out responses to FAQs about demonstrating Covid status (otherwise called Covid status certification or vaccine passports) and use of the NHS Covid Pass in England.]

Clearing the backlog caused by the pandemic: ninth report of Session 2021–22.
House of Commons Health and Social Care Committee; 2021.
[This report finds that elective recovery plans are threatened by pressure on emergency care with a record number of 999 calls and waiting times in emergency departments at record levels. It concludes that tackling the wider backlog caused by the pandemic is a major and ‘unquantifiable’ challenge. It calls for a broad national health and care recovery plan to include mental health, primary care, community care and social care as well as emergency care.]

Telephone survey two: PCNs and Covid-19.
PRUComm; 2021.
[The purpose of the telephone survey was to try to understand the role primary care networks (PCNs) had played in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, focusing on whether the pandemic had influenced and shaped the development and operation of PCNs and whether PCNs had worked collectively or as individual practices in their Covid-19 response. This short report comprises data collected between August and December 2020.]

Inequality and the Covid crisis in the United Kingdom.
Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS); 2022.
[IFS Working Paper W22/01. This report reviews the effects on the Covid-19 pandemic on inequalities in education, the labour market, household living standards, mental health and wealth in the UK.]

Effects of COVID-19 lockdown on eating disorders and obesity: A systematic review and meta-analysis.[Abstract]
Sideli L. European Eating Disorders Review 2021;29(6):826-841.
[The majority of individuals with EDs and obesity reported symptomatic worsening during the lockdown. However, further longitudinal studies are needed to identify vulnerable groups, as well as the long-term consequences of COVID-19.]

Public Health

Current awareness updates

Prostate cancer.
National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE); 2021.
[This quality standard covers managing prostate cancer in people referred to secondary care or having follow-up for prostate cancer in primary care. It describes high-quality care in priority areas for improvement. In December 2021, changes were made to align this quality standard with the updated NICE guideline on prostate cancer.]

Combined adult and paediatric respiratory clinical assessment service (RCAS) hubs for acute respiratory infection.
NHS England and NHS Improvement; 2021.
[This document supports systems to plan for a likely rise in respiratory infections (for example, Covid-19, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), influenza and other infections) this winter.]

Our Vision for the Women’s Health Strategy for England.
Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC); 2021.
[Analysis of call for evidence consultation response has informed development of this document, which is published alongside the consultation response. This document sets out the government’s vision and the publication of the strategy will follow in 2022.]

Children and young people’s mental health:eighth Report of Session 2021–22.
House of Commons Health and Social Care Committee; 2021.
[This report calls for urgent action to prevent mental health services slipping backwards as a result of additional demand created by the pandemic and the scale of unmet need prior to it. MPs found that despite progress in numbers of young people receiving treatment, it was unacceptable that more than half with a diagnosable condition pre-pandemic do not receive the mental health support they need.]

Public Health

Current awareness updates

Children and young people’s mental health.
House of Commons Health and Social Care Committee; 2021.
[According to NHS data, the mental health of children and young people in England has worsened since 2017. Even before the pandemic, children and young people were facing a mental health crisis. Three lockdowns and the social distancing requirements of the pandemic have exacerbated the struggle with the loss of normal social structures, being unable to socialise in person with peers and not being able to attend school or university.]

Ventilation, ventilation, ventilation.
Trades Union Congress (TUC); 2021.
[Every workplace risk assessment should include aerosol transmission, and outline what steps are being taken to improve ventilation where necessary. Ventilation being one of the most effective ways to mitigate risk, but it’s the one employers are least likely to be paying attention to.]

Public Health

Current awareness updates

Weight management tier 2 interventions and their effectiveness.
Carried out by Frankie Marcelline from Sussex Health on 2/12/2021
[This evidence search report looks for recent evaluations and reports on the effectiveness of weight management tier 2 interventions for families, adults and children. A starting point might be Public Health England’s 2020 summary: Weight management services during COVID-19: phase 1 insights. Another source is Heggie’s: Tackling reporting issues and variation in behavioural weight management interventions.]

Brain tumours (primary) and brain metastases in adults.
National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE); 2021.
[This quality standard covers diagnosing, monitoring and managing any type of primary brain tumour or brain metastases in adults (aged 16 or over). It describes high-quality care in priority areas for improvement.]

Urinary incontinence in women.
National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE); 2021.
[This quality standard covers managing urinary incontinence in women (aged 18 and over). It covers assessment, care and treatment options. It describes high-quality care in priority areas for improvement.
It does not cover urinary incontinence in women with neurological disease. In December 2021, changes were made to align this quality standard with the new NICE guideline on pelvic floor dysfunction.]

Pelvic floor dysfunction: prevention and non-surgical management.
National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE); 2021.
[This guideline covers the prevention, assessment and non-surgical management of pelvic floor dysfunction in women aged 12 and over. It aims to raise awareness and help women to reduce their risk of pelvic floor dysfunction. For women who have pelvic floor dysfunction, the guideline recommends interventions based on their specific symptoms]

Management of acute respiratory illness in prisons and places of detention.
UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA); 2021.
[This guidance will assist in the management of outbreaks of acute respiratory illness in prisons and places of detention. The guidance covers risk assessment, testing recommendations, antiviral therapies and when an outbreak can be declared over. An associated flow chart gives information for management depending on whether COVID-19 and/or influenza have been detected.]

BCG vaccination and SCID screening: patient pathway.
UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA); 2021.
[Flowchart showing the Bacillus Calmette–Guérin (BCG) vaccination and SCID screening patient pathway (updated 09 December 2021)]

Optimising chronic wound care: a human and financial necessity.
Penfold J. British Journal of Healthcare Management 2021;27(11):269-271.
[Comment highlights the importance of evidence-based practice in wound care to reduce the burden on patients and healthcare services.]

Active Lives Children and Young People Survey: Academic year 2020-21.
Sport England; 2021.
[This report contains a full year of coronavirus (Covid-19) restrictions, including comparisons back to summer term 2020, when school sites were closed to most pupils for much of the period. The proportion of children and young people in England who are active remains unchanged compared to 12 months ago. However, inequalities have increased and for some groups of children and young people, in particular teenage girls and Black children are the least likely to be physically active.]

What science has shown can help young people with anxiety and depression.
Wellcome; 2021.
[This report summarises what we’ve learned about the evidence for ‘active ingredients’ of effective interventions for youth anxiety and depression – these are the aspects of interventions that make a difference in preventing or managing anxiety and depression.]

Project ADDER.
Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC); 2021.
[Information on Project ADDER (Addiction, Diversion, Disruption, Enforcement and Recovery), the government’s pathfinder programme combatting drugs misuse.]

Global Drug Survey (GDS) 2021 Global Report.
Global Drug Survey (GDS); 2021.
[The focus is on how COVID-19 changed people’s drug using behaviours especially with regard to alcohol, cannabis and cocaine, how people balance reducing harm and maximizing pleasure when using drugs, and whether microdosing has moved beyond those seeking to improve creativity and work performance to self-treatment for mental health issues.]

Alcohol-specific deaths in the UK: registered in 2020.
Office for National Statistics (ONS); 2021.
[Deaths caused by diseases known to be a direct consequence of alcohol misuse by sex, age, region and deprivation.]

From harm to hope: A 10-year drugs plan to cut crime and save lives.
Home Office, Department of Health and Social Care, Ministry of Justice, Department for Work and Pensions, Department for Education, and Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities; 2021.
[This policy paper sets out the government’s 10-year plan to cut crime and save lives by reducing the supply and demand for drugs and delivering a high-quality treatment and recovery system. Commitments are made across the government to break drug supply chains while simultaneously reducing the demand for drugs by getting people suffering from addiction into treatment, and deterring recreational drug use.]

Child of the North: building a fairer future after Covid-19.
NIHR Northern Health Science Alliance; 2021.
[This report paints a stark picture of inequality for children growing up in the north of England post-pandemic compared with those in the rest of the country. It looks at a wide range of factors, from child poverty to children in care, to build up a picture of ‘The Child of the North’. It sets out 18 clear recommendations that can be put in place to tackle the widening gap between the north and the rest of England.]

Children and young people’s mental health: Eighth Report of Session 2021–22.
House of Commons Health and Social Care Committee; 2021.
[Report highlights that the problems identified can only be addressed by government departments, local government and the health system acting together to promote good mental health and prevent new crises emerging. It recommends setting up a Cabinet sub-committee.]