To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) in which NHS trusts have transplant operations been performed on foreign nationals in the last 12 months; which organs or tissues were transplanted in each case; and how the (a) trust and (b) NHS were remunerated for the procedure; (246830)

Departmental Directions, issued in September 2005 by authority of the Secretary of State for Health under section 17 of the National Health Service Act 1977 to NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT), specify that priority for transplants should be given to group 1 patients (mainly people ordinarily resident in the United Kingdom or in countries with which the UK has reciprocal health arrangements) rather than group 2 (those not in group 1). Group 1 includes European Union residents. Group 2 patients are only entitled to an organ if there is no one in group 1 who is clinically suitable. It is the responsibility of the consultant registering each patient for transplant to confirm eligibility, and NHSBT and/or transplant centres are then responsible for ensuring organs are correctly allocated based on eligibility information supplied.

The transplantation of donated organs into non-UK EU residents who qualify for NHS treatment is guided by European law, which effectively regards such patients as having equal access to the NHS. Decisions over accepting a patient on to the transplant waiting list rests with the individual transplant centre. Article 3 of Regulation 1408/71 provides for equality of treatment under the regulation. Therefore health care should be provided in the UK to another European economic area national on the same basis as it would be to a UK national. Under EU Regulation 1408/71 a citizen of a member state can seek prior authorisation (via an E112) from their health authorities to go to another member state for planned state-sector treatment. The decision about whether to authorise a referral is a clinical one by that citizen’s member state, taking into account factors such as whether undue delay applies or whether it is a specialist treatment that the home state cannot supply. The citizen’s member state covers the cost of the referral.

Patients receiving transplants in the UK would normally receive organs from UK donors. The exception to this would be organs supplied from elsewhere in the EU under reciprocal arrangements which exist to offer organs to other member states if there is no clinically suitable patient in the member state of origin.

Table 1 shows organs received from non-UK hospitals imported into UK hospitals and transplanted between 1998 to 2008.

Table 2 shows organ and ocular tissue transplants in the UK between 1998 to 2008, by trust of transplanting hospital, where the recipient is recorded as being resident outside the UK.