§ Ms Walley:To ask the Secretary of State for Health what his Department's policy is on patients being (a) offered a choice and (b) consulted on the gender of the nurses and careworkers who treat them; and if he will make a statement. [126687]
§ Mr. Hutton:The Department is committed to increasing patient choice in the national health service to ensure that its services are more responsive to the needs of individual patients. The first step in increasing patient choice is to provide patients waiting for elective surgery with choice over the hospital in which they are treated. By the summer of 2004, all patients waiting six months for surgery will be offered the choice to move to another hospital. From December 2005, patients who may require elective surgery will be offered a choice of four or five hospitals or providers when their general practitioner refers them. We have also launched a national consultation exercise—'Choice, Responsiveness and Equity in the NHS and social care'—to get the views of patients and NHS staff on extending patient choice within the NHS beyond elective surgery. Fundamental to increasing the responsiveness of services is ensuring that patients are afforded privacy and dignity, including taking into account their views as to the gender of their nurses and care workers.