Patients are switching GP practices to try and ‘get around’ rationing of services such as IVF, a health minister has claimed.
Jackie Doyle-Price criticised the ‘unacceptable’ disparity in health treatments across the UK for creating postcode lotteries.
She claims women are signing up with surgeries further away from their own home because their own CCG does not offer enough rounds of IVF.
Ms Doyle-Price said her own CCG has recently cut the number of courses from three to two – going against official guidance.
Patients are switching GP practices to ‘get around’ rationing of services like IVF, health minister Jackie Doyle-Price has claimed
Speaking in the House of Commons last week, she said: ‘The postcode lottery is not acceptable, and patients manage to get around it.
‘My local CCG, having funded three courses of IVF, has had to reduce that to two because demand has doubled owing to the lack of provision in neighbouring CCGs.’
Ms Doyle-Price later confirmed she meant patients switch to a GP operating under a different CCG that offers more rounds of IVF.
Ms Doyle-Price was responding to a question in parliament from MP Rachel Maclean, who said: ‘Provision of IVF in Redditch has been reduced from two cycles to one.
‘I warmly welcome the work that the minister has done to increase equity across the country.
‘But what more can she do to address the postcode lottery in this and other areas, such as hip and knee surgery?’
CCGs, or clinical commissioning groups, are the local boards in charge of funding for GP surgeries and hospitals in the area.
They ration procedures, including hip replacements, cataract surgery and diabetic glucose monitors, in order to save money to redirect it elsewhere.
Patients can switch GP practice to one that is not in their area under the out-of-area patient choice scheme which came into effect in 2015.
GP practices can register new patients who live outside the catchment area, without any obligation to provide home visits.
Approximately 99,000 people are registered with a GP this way, according to NHS data.
However, it is not clear how many women may be using the scheme to benefit from more IVF cycles.
Dr Richard Vautrey, of the British Medical Association, said: ‘The BMA has always been clear that patients should have access to all NHS services wherever they live.
He added that the BMA appreciate commissioners ‘are under pressure to meet rising demand despite increasingly stretched resources’.
However, Dr Vautrey said: ‘National access to services should be equitable, clear and non-discriminatory.
‘If, as a result of CCG financial pressure and cuts to services, patients feel they have to switch to another CCG to access treatments that are not available in their own area, it not only underlines the unfairness in these commissioning “postcode lotteries”, but also risks destabilising the way local services run.’
Guidelines from watchdog the National Institute for Heath and Care Excellence (NICE) recommend eligible women under 40 should be offered three full IVF cycles.
However, figures from 2018 reveal that only 13 per cent of areas in England offer three cycles. This is down from 24 per cent in 2013.
The campaign group Fertility Fairness highlighted how, in some parts of the country, couples have to pay thousands of pounds for private treatment, while other trusts provide a full service funded by the taxpayer.
Seven CCGs out of 208 have reportedly stopped offering IVF on the NHS entirely.
Ms Doyle-Price said: ‘I have made it very clear that it is unacceptable for any CCG to offer no IVF cycles at all, I have given them that guidance.’
Ms Doyle-Price’s local health board, NHS Thurrock CCG, said it was ‘correct’ that there is variation in IVF treatment offered by CCGs.
Ms Maclean’s CCG NHS Redditch and Bromsgrove said it made the decision to cut the IVF cycles two years ago due to a ‘financial challenge’.