Health and Sport Committee

Meeting date: Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Official Report 329KB pdf

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Petition

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Sleep Apnoea (PE953)

Agenda item 4 is consideration of petition PE953, by Jean Gall, on behalf of the Scottish Association for Sleep Apnoea. Members have a copy of a paper that sets out the action that has been taken on the petition to date.

As members know, I have had an interest in the petition and the Scottish Association for Sleep Apnoea. I state that for the record. Jean Gall is also a constituent of mine.

The committee considered the petition in December 2009, after which we wrote to NHS Quality Improvement Scotland and the Scottish intercollegiate guidelines network to seek updates on guidance on the treatment of obstructive sleep apnoea in Scotland. We also wrote to the UK Department for Transport and the UK Medical Research Council to seek an update on the latest research on the issue. Responses from all those organisations were considered at our meeting on 2 June 2010 and copies of the responses were provided to the petitioner. At that meeting, the committee agreed to write back to the UK Department for Transport and the UK Medical Research Council, seeking more detailed information about the various research studies due to report in late 2010 and responses to those requests are before us today.

Do members have any comments?

I welcome the work that the variety of Government departments and other agencies mentioned in our papers have been carrying out on this matter, but I have to sound a note of disappointment. I cannot remember the precise year, but this issue was first raised 10 or 11 years ago in the first session of the Parliament. It has taken such a long time—some might say too long—to get a resolution to this problem. Notwithstanding all the good work that is on-going and the fact that people are willing to address this issue, there is a degree of frustration and I feel that we have to get some urgency into this.

I agree. I actually spoke in Kenny Gibson’s members’ business debate on sleep apnoea when the Parliament was up the road. Although things have taken a long time, the approach had to be thorough and tremendous progress has been made. We should all thank Jean Gall for bringing the issue to our attention and for helping to move the issue along.

I share Helen Eadie’s view that a more vigorous approach could have been taken, not in the Parliament, but across the UK in general to what is a very serious issue. More and more people are becoming aware of sleep apnoea and, indeed, other sleep disorders and the impact that they can have on not only individuals and family and work life, but workplace safety. The scariest thing that I heard related to someone suffering from sleep apnoea who worked in air traffic control. It quite took my breath away to think that they might have dropped off unawares with planes flying around.

Although I invite the committee to close the petition, I understand that it will be open to someone in the next parliamentary session to come back and raise the issue. I certainly hope that that will happen.

Perhaps if our legacy paper flagged up the fact that the report will be published in 2013 our successor committee would be able to look at the issue again.

That was the first half of my suggestion.

You are a team. What is the second half?

Although this has all taken a long time, there is no doubt that the level of awareness of the condition has increased enormously. I was not a member in the second session of the Parliament, but I certainly think—and welcome the fact—that the Parliament and its committees in the third session have assisted in the process.

The downside of that increased awareness, however, is the substantial length of waiting lists for treatment in Glasgow and Edinburgh. We should point out in our legacy paper that one of the consequences of the Parliament’s awareness raising as a result of Jean Gall’s petition is that resources are under considerable pressure. The issue will certainly need to be examined in the next session.

The resources at the sleep centre at Edinburgh royal infirmary have always been under pressure.

I hope that Jean Gall, the petitioner, is not disappointed. After all, the Parliament is certainly aware of the issue and things seem to be moving. Moreover, it just shows what an individual can achieve through our petitions system, and that is greatly to be welcomed. No doubt the Public Petitions Committee will be informed of our position.

Do members agree to close the petition just now, but to keep a watching brief on the matter?

Members indicated agreement.

As previously agreed, we move into private session.

11:44 Meeting continued in private until 12:24.