Chamber and committees

No, the Scottish Government has not advised NHS Forth Valley to amend how it recorded periods of social unavailability.

All NHS boards were advised last year through new guidance that as of 1 October 2012 ‘social unavailability’ was being scrapped and replaced with “patient advised unavailability”, bringing the system into line with the Patient Rights (Scotland) Act. It is for boards to ensure they apply Scottish Government guidance accurately.

The internal audits on the management of waiting times at Forth Valley published on 20 December 2012 stated that it found no instances of inappropriate behaviour or pressure on staff to hide breached or manipulate data. Overall, patient records reviewed were accurate; however, improvements were identified surrounding some aspects of system operation and control, particularly in relation to the usage of different patient administrations systems for in-patients and out-patients.

I refer the member to the answer to question S4W-12454 on 5 February 2013. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

The information on the number of patients with a period of social unavailability on 30 June 2011 and 30 June 2012 (latest available published data) by NHS Board is provided in the following table. Official waiting times statistics for 31 December 2012 is due to be published by ISD Scotland on 26 February 2013.

Monthly Social Unavailability as at Census date

Source: ISD Scotland.

The Independent Evaluation of the Health Board Elections carried out by the London School of Economics reported that the costs associated with introducing elections to all Scottish health boards would be in the region of £12 million, dependent upon the model used.

The Scottish Government will take this information in to account as it considers the independent evaluation on health board elections and alternative pilots.

Each local authority has been given an allocation of funding as part of a three year programme to support transformation in adult social care and children’s services for self-directed support. The following table details the amounts allocated to each local authority for transformation funding 2012 to 2015.

The Scottish Government has not been prescriptive in setting the proportion of transformation funding that should be spent on transitional or “bridging” costs and this will vary between local authorities.

*This includes £25,000 awarded to each local authority, specifically to enable children’s services teams to engage in SDS implementation.

The commencement date for the Social Care (Self-directed Support) (Scotland) Act 2013 has yet to be decided by Scottish Ministers. In setting a date ministers will take into consideration the view of the SDS Programme board, who will make a recommendation after their next meeting on 18 February 2013.

After the powers and duties of the Act come into force, local authorities will continue to implement the National Strategy on Self-directed Support.

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that people living with chronic pain can access high quality, safe and effective treatment as close to home as possible. The National Chronic Pain Steering Group is overseeing a range of work to assist boards in improving access to chronic pain services.

For a small proportion of people more specialised treatment may be required. National Services Scotland is currently assessing options for the most appropriate service model for Scotland. They expect to complete this work by the end of summer 2013, following which we will then be in a position to formally update Parliament and relevant stakeholders of the outcome.

NHS National Services Scotland is currently assessing options for the most appropriate service model for Scotland. This work is expected to be completed by the end of summer 2013.

NHS National Services Scotland (NSS) is currently assessing options for the most appropriate service model for Scotland. As part of its assessment NSS will consider the cost and clinical effectiveness of all the options. This work is expected to be completed by the end of summer 2013.