Diabetes
Health

Keith Vaz (Leicester East, Labour)

To ask the Secretary of State for Health what steps his Department is taking to produce high-quality cost data on local diabetes services.

Paul Burstow (Minister of State (Care Services), Health; Sutton and Cheam, Liberal Democrat)

The main source of cost data in the national health service by disease is programme budgeting data. Commissioner level programme budgeting data is published annually in the form of a benchmarking tool that enables commissioners to identify:

how they spend their allocation over 23 disease categories and their respective subcategories; diabetes is one of these categories; and

how their expenditure distribution pattern compares with other commissioners nationally, locally or with similar characteristics.

The programme budgeting data allocate all relevant NHS expenditure to a disease category (in this case diabetes).

The latest version of the Programme Budgeting PCT Benchmarking Tool contains estimates of expenditure for the 2010-11 financial year and is available on:

www.dh.gov.uk/en/Managingyourorganisation/Financeandplanning/Programmebudgeting/DH_075743

The National Diabetes Information Service and the NHS Information Centre provide support to the NHS at a local and national level providing information to aid decision making and prioritising care for people with diabetes.