(2) how many amputees in the armed forces have been sent to the US for medical treatment in the last three years;
(3) how much his Department spent on sending armed forces amputees to the US for medical treatment in each of the last three years.
The Ministry of Defence has committed to publishing on a quarterly basis the numbers of service personnel who have suffered limb amputations as a result of injuries sustained while on operational deployment, and Defence Analytical Services and Advice (DASA) published figures up to the end of 2009 on 12 February 2010, available on its website at:
www.dasa.mod.uk
These figures will include partial or complete limb amputees. In order to protect patient confidentiality, those who have suffered limb amputations above the wrist or ankle on more than one limb will be reported annually as “significant multiple amputees”.
Injured UK service personnel who require prosthetic limbs attend the Defence Medical Rehabilitation Centre at Headley Court in Surrey, where they are supplied with tailor-made prostheses with state of the art componentry which is matched to their clinical needs.
The Defence Medical Services (DMS) keep in touch with developments in rehabilitation in other countries, including the United States, and assess new developments carefully to judge fully their potential benefits for our people. To date the DMS have not referred any amputees to the United States for their medical treatment, although a few individual amputees have attended private US facilities of their own volition and without cost to the Department. No personnel have been forced to receive treatment in the USA, and until alternative treatments and rehabilitation regimes have been fully evaluated it would be inappropriate to deviate from current, clinically proven approaches.