Access to Diagnostics

Part of 2. Questions to the Minister for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 2:39 pm on 8 March 2023.

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Photo of Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan Labour 2:39, 8 March 2023

Thanks very much. I think it is important that we embrace new innovations where there's a clinical indication that they are helpful. Obviously, we need to balance that off against our ability to pay for them. But in this space, we have actually spent a lot of money on diagnostics—£51 million to replace diagnostic equipment, £25 million to replace imaging equipment and £25 million for four new PET scanners. We will be publishing a new national diagnostic plan in April. I recently had a meeting with the people who'd developed the plan, not just in Wales. I wanted to be very clear what is happening elsewhere, and so I spoke to UK experts as well about, 'How does this compare to yours? Where do we need to go? Are we far behind? Are we ahead?' So, there are some very detailed conversations going on there. Obviously, you've heard the proposals to build a new diagnostic centre in Cwm Taf. As I mentioned in response to your question, we will be seeing some support and working to see if we can develop a regional diagnostic centre between Swansea and Hywel Dda.