§ Mr. Simon HughesTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what information his Department collates on costs per hospital procedure in each trust. [10420]
§ Mr. MilburnA limited amount of information is available on average specialty costs but this is not attributable to individual procedures or individual trusts.
Information on the prices of extra-contractual referrals has been collated at regional level for several years and is available on a trust by trust basis from the relevant regional office. The current year—1997–98—is the first year that this information has been collected nationally. The prices for surgical activity are based on costed health care resource groups—HRGs—which are a way of categorising patient treatments below specialty level. Each HRG contains a set of treatments that are clinically similar and should use roughly the same level of resources.
Extra-contractual referrals account for a small percentage of the overall activity of the national health service. These prices do not necessarily reflect the costs of activity provided through purchaser/provider agreements. In general, it is expected that ECR costs would be higher.
On occasions, procedure-based information is requested on a sample basis, to support specific initiatives.