- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 October 2023
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Current Status:
Answered by Michael Matheson on 16 November 2023
To ask the Scottish Government how it plans to fund the recently announced additional £100 million in each of the next three years to reduce NHS waiting lists.
Answer
The new annual funding will allow us to maximise capacity, build greater resilience into the system and deliver year-on-year reductions in the number of patients who have waited too long for treatment. It is expected the additional £100 million investment will help reduce inpatient and day-case waiting lists by an estimated 100,000 patients over three years.
As you know, decisions on the Government’s spending plans for 2024-25 and future years are subject to the outcome of the Scottish Budget process and associated approval by the Scottish Parliament. Therefore decisions on the allocation of this funding will be made following this process, along with more detail on year-on-year reductions. The Scottish Government intends to present the Draft Budget 2024-25 to Parliament on 19 December 2023.
Modelling scenarios that supported this are based on all inpatient/day-case specialities with a clear focus on the highest number of patients waiting for treatment, including ENT, General Surgery, Trauma and Orthopaedics and Ophthalmology. The modelling builds-in the capacity created through the implementation of productive opportunities and the redesign and expansion of community services, such as the Community Glaucoma Service and General Ophthalmic Services, as well as efficiencies such as regional and national working and maximising theatre capacity, including the new NTCs, through extended working.
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 October 2023
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Current Status:
Answered by Michael Matheson on 16 November 2023
To ask the Scottish Government, in light of its recent commitment to invest an additional £100 million in each of the next three years to reduce NHS waiting lists, what (a) modelling was undertaken to determine that waiting lists will be reduced by 100,000 by 2026 and (b) the estimated level of waiting lists by 2026 would be without this funding package.
Answer
I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-22289 on 16 November 2023. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 October 2023
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Current Status:
Answered by Michael Matheson on 16 November 2023
To ask the Scottish Government how it plans to allocate the recently announced additional £100 million in each of the next three years to reduce NHS waiting lists.
Answer
I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-22289 on 16 November 2023. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 26 October 2023
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Current Status:
Answered by Michael Matheson on 14 November 2023
To ask Scottish Government, further to the Cabinet Secretary for NHS Recovery, Health and Social Care's ministerial statement on winter planning and resilience on 24 October 2023, how many of the "additional 1,000 nurses, midwives and allied health professionals" (AHPs) from overseas who have joined NHS Scotland over the past two years were AHPs, broken down by profession.
Answer
In October 2022, we announced that further Scottish Government funding of £8m was being made available to recruit allied health professionals and midwives from overseas for the first time alongside nurses whereas the £4.5m funding in 2021 for international recruitment was provided solely for registered nurses.
I am pleased to advise that between October 2022 and 30 September 2023, a total of 109 AHPs have been recruited from overseas and are in posts across NHS Scotland, with further arrivals expected as we continue to support international recruitment. The Scottish Government does not hold data centrally relating to the AHP professions recruited to, that information is held by employing health boards.
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 26 October 2023
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Current Status:
Answered by Michael Matheson on 14 November 2023
To ask the Scottish Government whether there are exemptions from the Treatment Time Guarantee in certain specialities, and, if so, what these are.
Answer
Exceptions to the Treatment Time Guarantee, as set out by The Patient Rights (Treatment Time Guarantee) (Scotland) Regulations 2012 are as follows:
• Assisted reproduction.
• Obstetrics services
• Organ, tissue, or cell transplantation, whether from living or deceased donor.
Over 2.8 million inpatients and day cases have benefited from the 12-weeks treatment target since it was introduced.
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 26 October 2023
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Current Status:
Answered by Michael Matheson on 14 November 2023
To ask Scottish Government how many additional allied health professional (AHP) training spaces have been created as a result of the increase in training provision, as outlined by the Cabinet Secretary for NHS Recovery, Health and Social care during his ministerial statement on winter planning and resilience on 24 October 2023, broken down by profession.
Answer
The Scottish Government has significantly expanded AHP training, recruiting 335 Scottish-domiciled students each year for paramedic education programs from 2023 to 2026, and 25 students for specialist prosthetics and orthotics education programs each year from 2022 to 2026. With a substantial investment of £45 million recurrently for the Scottish Ambulance Service (SAS), and an additional £5 million, 317 staff are being recruited, including clinicians for an integrated clinical hub, enhancing triage and reducing emergency response needs. Additionally, £4.5 million is allocated to train 225 more MSK practitioners in Primary Care, and £1.2 million enhances Reporting Radiography training by 30 spaces.
As part of the Scottish Government's commitment to a sustainable healthcare workforce, efforts include creating opportunities for AHP career advancement. Key features of the AHP Education and Workforce Policy Review, are being implemented through an ongoing plan, demonstrating a comprehensive approach to fostering the growth and advancement of the AHP workforce.
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Monday, 13 November 2023
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Current Status:
Taken in the Chamber on 16 November 2023
To ask the First Minister what immediate action the Scottish Government is taking to address the reported crisis in social care, in light of the letter from the Coalition of Care and Support Providers in Scotland stating that the social care pay uplift is insufficient.
Answer
Taken in the Chamber on 16 November 2023
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 31 October 2023
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Current Status:
Answered by Jenni Minto on 13 November 2023
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will publish any paper on the potential implications of losing intensive care status in neonatal units.
Answer
The Best Start recommendation to move to a model of three intensive care units in Scotland was based on evidence that this will improve outcomes for the smallest and sickest babies.
The Framework for Practice ‘Criteria to Define Levels of Neonatal Care including Repatriation within NHS Scotland’, published on 25 July 2023 describes the care that can be provided at each level of neonatal care. It outlines that Local Neonatal Units can continue to care for babies requiring short periods of intensive care in accordance with agreed pathways.
In addition the British Association of Perinatal Medicine published ‘ Optimal Arrangements for Neonatal Intensive Care Units in the UK’ in 2021, which provides a framework for practice for neonatal care. This sets out the optimal arrangements for neonatal intensive care to provide the lowest mortality and morbidity, and the best baby and parent experience.
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 31 October 2023
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Current Status:
Answered by Jenni Minto on 13 November 2023
To ask the Scottish Government what evidence it considered regarding the potential consequences of separating a mother from their newborn in connection with the proposed location of neonatal intensive care units.
Answer
The Best Start emphasises parents as key partners in caring for their baby and aims to keep mothers and babies, and families together as much as possible in the crucial early weeks, with services designed around them.
The new model of care aims to minimise the separation of families, and to support parents with babies in neonatal care. We have a number of measures already in place to support families:
- Providing accommodation for parents to stay on or near neonatal units;
- Roll out of the Young Patients Family Fund (formerly the Neonatal Expenses Fund) to support families with the costs of travel, accommodation and food whilst their baby is in neonatal care;
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- Repatriating babies to their local neonatal units as soon as clinically possible.
Under the new model of care mothers in suspected extreme pre-term labour are transferred before they give birth (in-utero) to maternity units in the hospitals that have neonatal intensive care units. Experience from the Early Implementer Boards indicates that this will happen in the vast majority of cases. On occasion when it is not possible to transfer mothers before they give birth, the baby will be stabilised and transferred to a NICU by the specialist neonatal transport service ScotSTAR, and the mother will be transferred to the maternity unit in the same hospital as her baby.
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 31 October 2023
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Current Status:
Answered by Jenni Minto on 13 November 2023
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will publish the scoring methodology and underpinning detail used in identifying which neonatal services should be retained.
Answer
The Options Appraisal Report , published on 25 July 2023 describes the process undertaken to determine the three final Neonatal Intensive Care Units, and the feasibility analysis and testing that followed the conclusion of that process. Annex A of the Report includes the criteria and weighting used for the Options Appraisal Process. Annexes C and D of the report outline the data that supported the Options Appraisal process.
Further detail on the methodology and the scoring of individual units can be found as part of the following Freedom of Information request:
Information relating to Options Appraisal Report: FOI release - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)
