Chamber and committees

The Scottish Executive hasstockpiled 1.3 million courses of oseltamivir (known as Tamiflu), an antiviralmedicine which may reduce deaths and complications from an influenza pandemic. Although theavian influenza virus poses a risk to birds its risk to humans is extremelylimited.

A small percentage of thestockpile has been predistributed to NHS boards in accordance with the ScottishOperational Framework for Stockpiling, Distributing and Using AntiviralMedicines for Patient Treatment in the Event of Pandemic Influenza availableat:

http://www.sehd.scot.nhs.uk/pandemicflu/Pages/PanFluFramework.htm.

The numbersof children (less than 18 years of age) admitted to general facilities in Scottishpsychiatric hospitals for calendar years 1999 to 2003 are shown in the followingtable.

	Calendar Year
	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003P
Total patients admitted	348	322	318	310	262
Psychiatric Hospitals with no child /adolescent facilities
- patients admitted to all facilities	211	184	201	182	168
Psychiatric Hospitals with child /adolescent facilities
- patients admitted to child / adolescent facilities	55	62	78	53	31
- patients admitted to general facilities1	111	93	75	101	72

^PProvisional.

Source: ISD SMR04 linkedcatalog.

Note: 1. Due to coding inconsistenciesacross health boards, these figures may be an overcount.

Patients admittedmore than once within a year may be counted in more than one facility category inthe above table. The column sum may therefore exceed the patient total.

This information will be publishedby Health Protection Scotland in January 2007.

This information is not heldcentrally.

The following table lists thenumber of Whole Time Equivalent¹ school nurses in Scotland between1999 and 2005 (the most recent figures) at September of each year:

	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005
Number of Qualified School Nurses	277.5	289.0	309.8	302.6	294.0	300.7	305.2

Source: ISD Scotland.

Note: 1. Whole-time equivalentadjusts head count staff figures to take account of part-time staff.

A national mandatoryhealthcare associated infection surveillance system was introduced in 2001 tomonitor meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) bacteraemias (bloodinfections). From September 2006 mandatory reporting of meticillin-sensitiveStaphylococcus aureus (MSSA) bacteraemias has also been introduced. Cases ofMSSA bacteraemia reported to Health Protection Scotland prior to September 2006have been reported on a voluntary basis and as such compliance is variable and thedata have not been validated by HPS. These data should thus be interpreted withdue caution.

The data for which recordsare available are presented in the following table.

Health Board	MRSA					MSSA					Total S aureus
	2003	2004	2005	2006 Q1and2	Total	2003	2004	2005	2006 Q1and2	Total
Ayrshire and Arran	33	47	42	22	144	12	6	24	1	43	187
Borders	9	14	13	6	42	13	17	17	3	50	92
Dumfries and Galloway	7	26	29	13	75	16	35	30	18	99	174
Fife	51	49	67	39	206	32	44	47	44	167	373
Forth Valley	37	28	31	16	112	27	27	18	3	75	187
Grampian	52	61	64	50	227	128	126	167	87	508	735
Highland	20	24	29	7	80	37	34	38	16	125	205
Lanarkshire	65	85	99	49	298	45	59	32	31	167	465
Lothian	184	194	209	118	705	172	211	168	101	652	1,357
Greater Glasgow and Clyde	315	319	275	153	1,062	365	348	385	178	1,276	2,338
Orkney	0	0	1	0	1	0	0	0	0	0	1
Shetland	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	0	1
Tayside	99	124	113	53	389	106	91	93	55	345	734
Western Isles	3	2	3	0	8	0	0	0	0	0	8
Total	875	974	975	526	3,350	953	998	1,019	537	3,507	6,857

The figuresfor NHS Highland and NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde reflect the dissolution of NHS Argyll and Clyde.

The Executive is not aware ofany proven links between Borreliosis (Lyme’s Disease) and Myalgic Encephalomyelitis(ME).

Clinicians are expected to carryout tests appropriate to the range of symptoms presented.

Further to the answer toquestion S2W-11273 on 2 November 2004, there have been the following number of cases of methicillinresistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and methicillin sensitive Staphylococcusaureus (MSSA) isolated from blood samples since 2003. A new European monitoring scheme, EARSS (European Antimicrobial ResistanceSurveillance System), was introduced in 2004 and some additional MRSA cases recordedas a result of improved data capture are reflected in the figures for 2004 onwards.

Year	MRSA	MSSA
2003	755	1,259
2004	976	998
2005	968	1,019
To March 2006	274	269

 

All answers to writtenparliamentary questions are available on the Parliaments website, the search facilityfor which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search.

The new lead clinician for diabetesin Scotland, Dr Donald Pearson, was appointed in August 2006.

All NHS boards, with the exceptionof Orkney, have a lead clinician and manager in post to support diabetes managedclinical networks. In Orkney, the lead clinician post has been unfilled for twoyears and the network manager post has been unfilled for five months. The imminentestablishment of a Community Health Partnership has enabled these gaps to be addressedand it is expected that a lead clinician will be in post by October. A new jointmanagement structure encompassing the diabetes, coronary heart disease and strokemanaged clinical networks will be put in place during the autumn.

The information requested isnot centrally available.