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Dept of Health

Answer

Mr. Kevin Hughes: To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what system will be put in place to monitor and evaluate the measurements of progress outlined in the Transplant Framework for England, Saving Lives, Valuing Donors; and what action he will take in the event of primary care trusts failing to make progress;. [144892] (2) what role he envisages charities and voluntary organisations will play in the implementation of the Transplant Framework for England, Saving Lives, Valuing Donors; [144893] (3) whether his Department will be providing additional funding for the implementation of the recommendations outlined in the Transplant Framework for England, Saving Lives, Valuing Donors. [144932] Ms Rosie Winterton: UK Transplant already closely monitors most aspects of organ donation and transplantation. The information UK Transplant collects and analyses on organ donation and transplant activity is available on its web-site at www.uktransplant.org.uk. In developing their transplant services, it will be for primary care trusts and specialist commissioning teams to take account of local needs and priorities to allocate resources and benchmark their performance against published activity data. As organ transplantation is of proven clinical and cost effectiveness, maximising donation and transplantation rates will be important for both patients and the National Health Service. We envisage that voluntary organisations will continue to play an important part in research, raising awareness about organ donation, particularly by encouraging people to join the organ donor register and supporting the families of donors and transplant recipients. The Department has provided around £7 million via UK Transplant since 2001 to boost organ donation through the employment of 35 donor liaison nurses working with staff in critical units to help identify potential donors and how to approach and support relatives; 23 living donor co-ordinators working with families considering live donation and funding 10 non- heartbeating programmes to increase the number of organs from non-heartbeating donors.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

416 c626-7W;416 c624-5W; 144892;144893;144932

Session

2003-04

Subjects

Charities Health services Finance Donors Standards Voluntary organisations Transplant surgery

Contains statistics

Yes

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk