§ Mr. BurstowTo ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will list the areas where his Department's report, Policy Research Programme: providing a knowledge base for health, public health and social care, has provided the basis for improvements in information to disabled people. [23357]
§ Ms JowellThe Department of Health has funded improvements to information databases on disability equipment maintained by the Disabled Living Foundation and the Royal National Institute for the Blind. This followed evaluations in the Policy Research Programme suggesting that the European Union's Handynet system was not meeting the needs of users in the United Kingdom.
A range of other research is commissioned which relates to policy on physical disability, sensory impairment, learning disability and the health of older people. It covers a broad spectrum of acute care and continuing health and social care including work of community nurses and therapy professions. The broad aim of the research programme is to provide information that will assist in the policy formulation on integrated services to meet the needs of elderly, disabled or vulnerable people and to enable them to live in the community where possible.