Written questions, answers and statements

Eyesight: Surgery

Show full question

Question for Department of Health and Social Care

UIN 185690, tabled on 30 October 2018

Question

Mr Ranil Jayawardena
Conservative
North East Hampshire
Commons

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that providers of laser eye surgery clearly outline the risks of that procedure to patients prior to such surgery taking place.

Answer

Caroline Dinenage
Conservative
Gosport
Commons

Answered on

5 November 2018

Public and private sector providers of laser eye surgery are required by law to register with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) for regulation and doctors in the United Kingdom are required to register with the General Medical Council (GMC). The CQC and the GMC have a range of powers for addressing failures in care.

Providers are also expected to follow the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines on photorefractive (laser) surgery. The CQC, NICE and the Royal College of Ophthalmologists are all clear that the risks and complications of such procedures should be discussed with patients beforehand.

No estimate has been made of the number of people experiencing long-term side effects as a result of laser eye surgery because this data is not held centrally.

Answered by

Department of Health and Social Care
Named day
Named day questions only occur in the House of Commons. The MP tabling the question specifies the date on which they should receive an answer. MPs may not table more than five named day questions on a single day.