Claims some NHS treatments are being '˜rationed'

Ear Surgery On A Patient licenced by Creative Commons John Asselin

Patients are having to wait longer and be in greater pain before being eligible for a growing number of NHS treatments, councillors were told.

And claims of rationing led those councillors to call on health chiefs to explain why some procedures will no longer be as readily available.

The range of operations available to fewer patients include knee and hip replacements, prolapse surgery, tonsil removal and gallstone surgery.

With the threshold being raised before patients are offered such treatment, critics said that it was down to cost and cuts in funding.

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The debate played out at Portslade Town Hall at a meeting of the Brighton and Hove City Council health overview and scrutiny committee.

Councillors were asked to note a report showing an increasing number of treatments where doctors will have to show that patients have a ‘significant clinical need’.

The policy is known as ‘clinically effective commissioning’ and the number of treatments listed under the policy has risen from 39 to 107.

At a previous meeting of the committee last year, Brighton and Hove Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) chairman Dr David Supple described some of the changes as ‘easy wins’.

He indicated that it was easy to justify stricter criteria for procedures such as plastic surgery and cosmetic facial procedures before the NHS will pay.

But he accepted that there were ambiguities when dealing with some treatments and that others were ‘emotive’.

Green councillor Louise Greenbaum said that she wanted the CCG to give more detail about the decision-making process.

She said: “I do not want to note this report. This is the third or fourth time we have had (clinically effective commissioning) before this committee.

“I hope we provide scrutiny. We have not got the information to do that.

“I ask that the committee gets to see the evidence behind the decision.”

Labour councillor Kevin Allen supported a move to press the CCG to provide evidence of a detailed review of the various treatments.

He said: “We absolutely have to have the details. When this first came out I was criticised because I said it was rationing, which may be vulgar on my part.

“It may be all obvious and clinical but… the cost of the procedures has been balanced against the health benefits. It is rationing.”