§ 44. Mr. Evelyn Kingasked the Secretary of State for Social Services what additional annual cost is likely to be incurred as a result of the insistence by nurses or their trade union on a nurse accompanying a consultant required to assess the suitability of an inmate for admission to a public hospital from a prison or elsewhere; and how many consultants object to this practice and decline to be so accompanied.
§ Mr. MoyleThe information requested is not available. I am aware of the concern of the psychiatric profession about the terms of the appendix to Health Notice (77)97. This was not intended to imply that a consultant psychiatrist visiting a prison must invariably be accompanied by a nurse. There will clearly be occasions on which this would be quite unnecessary. On the other hand, where a prisoner is being examined with a view to the offer, on behalf of the health authority, of a place in a particular hospital, joint medical and nursing assessment will frequently avoid subsequent difficulty. It is for the consultant to decide in the light of the particular circumstances of each case how he should make his assessment.