Chamber and committees

Questions and answers

Parliamentary questions can be asked by any MSP to the Scottish Government or the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The questions provide a means for MSPs to get factual and statistical information.

Written questions must be answered within 10 working days (20 working days during recess)
Other questions such as Topical, Portfolio, General and First Minister's Question Times are taken in the Chamber

Urgent Questions aren't included in the Question and Answers search. There is a SPICe fact sheet listing Urgent and emergency questions.

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Question reference: S2W-27432

Asked by: Nanette Milne, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 17 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Lewis Macdonald on 14 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how many (a) adults and (b) children registered with an NHS dental practice in each year since 1995.

The information requested isprovided in the following table.

Total Number of Adults andChildren Registered with an NHS General Dental Practitioner; At 31 March

Year	Number of adult registrations	Number of child registrations
1995	1,849,884	623,874
1996	1,942,469	635,945
1997	2,027,245	637,743
1998	2,034,688	710,064
1999	1,891,328	726,124
2000	1,972,310	754,545
2001	1,969,008	743,469
2002	1,960,605	733,743
2003	1,959,293	725,494
2004	1,935,634	716,070
2005	1,915,492	711,847
2006	1,877,945	707,371

Source: MIDAS(Management Information & Dental Accounting System).

Question reference: S2W-27526

Asked by: Nanette Milne, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 9 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what the average waiting times are for patients with breast cancer, broken down by NHS board or managed clinical network.

I refer the member to thequestion S2W-25424, answered on 10 May 2006. All answers to writtenparliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the searchfacility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search.

The latest available informationfor the quarter October - December 2005 is available on http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Health/health/cancer/waiting-times/Intro.

Question reference: S2W-27525

Asked by: Nanette Milne, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 9 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what the mortality rate is of patients with breast cancer, broken down by NHS board or managed clinical network.

Question reference: S2W-27523

Asked by: Nanette Milne, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 9 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what proportion of breast cancers are HER-2 positive, broken down by NHS board or managed clinical network.

Question reference: S2W-27521

Asked by: Nanette Milne, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 9 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what the incidence is of breast cancer, broken down by NHS board or managed clinical network.

Question reference: S2W-27527

Asked by: Nanette Milne, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 9 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what plans it has to increase the capacity available to deliver intravenous therapies to cancer patients.

Question reference: S2W-27522

Asked by: Nanette Milne, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 9 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what proportion of breast cancer patients are tested for their HER-2 status at diagnosis, broken down by NHS board or managed clinical network.

Question reference: S2W-27524

Asked by: Nanette Milne, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 9 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what proportion of HER-2 positive patients are given Herceptin, broken down by NHS board or managed clinical network.

The information requested isnot held centrally.

The Scottish MedicinesConsortium (SMC) published their guidance on 12 June advising that Herceptin isaccepted for restricted use within NHSScotland for the treatment of patientswith HER2 positive early breast cancer following surgery, chemotherapy(neoadjuvant or adjuvant) and radiotherapy (if applicable). NHS boards areexpected to take account of SMC advice and ensure that recommended medicinesare made available to meet clinical need.

Question reference: S2W-27407

Asked by: Nanette Milne, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 14 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 9 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of cancer patients wait longer than four weeks for radiotherapy.

Question reference: S2W-27402

Asked by: Nanette Milne, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 14 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 9 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how many in-patient and day cases are on hospital waiting lists, also expressed as a rate per 100,000 of the population, and how the (a) median and (b) average wait in days compared with the equivalent figures for England in each of the last 16 quarters.

Information on the number ofpatients on the in-patient and day case waiting list and the waiting list as arate per 100,000 of the population, for the last 16 quarters, is provided intable 1.

The majority of patients whorequire in-patient and day case treatment are treated quickly. Nearly 53% of the patients treated in NHSScotland hospitals receive immediate treatment andnever join a waiting list. Of those who do wait, over 40% are admitted within 1months and over 70% within 3 months.

Thedistribution of waiting times for in-patient discharges is highly positivelyskewed. The arithmetic mean is an inappropriate statistical measure for suchdistributions because a very small number of long waiting times can have adisproportionate effect on the mean waiting time.

The median and mean are not targets forNHSScotland; they are only summary measures for patients who waited fortreatment. Reducing maximum waiting times is the Scottish Executive’s priorityfor NHSScotland. The currentnational maximum waiting time for in-patient and day case treatment is 6months. This will be reduced to 18 weeks by the end of 2007.

NHSScotland is delivering onthe 6 month national maximum waiting time and is making good progress towardsmeeting the next key target of a maximum wait of 18 weeks by the end of 2007.At that point, a new approach to defining and measuring waiting will also beintroduced to replace availability status codes (ASCs), which have the effectat present of excluding patients from waiting times guarantees where forexample, they are medically unfit for treatment, where they have asked fortheir treatment to be postponed, or where their treatment is highly specialisedor of low clinical priority. The new approach will be fairer, more consistentand more transparent.

Median and mean waiting times are derivedfrom retrospective analyses of waiting times for hospital treatment. These are compiledfrom SMR01 returns and are based on data that does not record whether patientshave had an ASC applied. The information requested on median and mean waitingtimes is provided in table 2. It includes the waiting times of patients who have been exempted fromwaiting times guarantees for the reasons given above and therefore overstatestrue waiting times. It is not possible to estimate the extent of theoverstatement.

Waiting list andwaiting times information for England are not directly comparable with Scottishdata due to definitional differences in the collection systems. Information onwaiting lists and waiting times for England is availableat

http://www.performance.doh.gov.uk/waitingtimes/index.htm.

Table1

NHSScotland:Number Of Scottish Residents On The In-patient And Day Case Waiting List AndThe Rate Per 100,000 Of Population On Each Quarterly Census Date From 30 June2002 To 31 March 2006.

Census Date	Number of Inpatient and Day Case Waiting List	Waiting List Per 100,000 of Population
30 June 2002	105,077	2,079
30 September 2002	107,181	2,120
31 December 2002	108,661	2,150
31 March 2003	107,338	2,122
30 June 2003	111,986	2,214
30 September 2003	110,485	2,185
31 December 2003	111,861	2,212
31 March 2004	110,089	2,168
30 June 2004	112,183	2,209
30 September 2004	112,353	2,212
31 December 2004	113,870	2,242
31 March 2005	112,481	2,208
30 June 2005	111,878	2,196
30 September 2005	109,823	2,156
31 December 2005	108,371	2,127
31 March 2006	106,306	2,087

Source ISD SMR3, General RegisterOffice for Scotland

Table 2

NHScotland: Median And Mean WaitingTimes² For In-patient And Day Cases Admitted From The Waiting ListFor Each Quarter From 30 June 2002 To 31 March 2006^p

Quarter Ending	Median Wait¹ (Days)	Mean Wait¹ (Days)
30 June 2002²	34	71
30 September 2002²	36	76
31 December 2002²	36	77
31 March 2003²	40	81
30 June 2003	39	79
30 September 2003	41	82
31 December 2003	40	84
31 March 2004	43	83
30 June 2004	42	79
30 September 2004	43	81
31 December 2004	42	82
31 March 2005	48	85
30 June 2005	43	78
30 September 2005	42	76
31 December 2005	44	77
31 March 2006^p	49	78

^PProvisional

Source ISD SMR01

¹Includes patients with an Availability Status Code. Consequently, true waitingtimes are likely to be overstated because of periods of unavailability.

² Includes information on patientsadmitted from the deferred waiting list until its abolition on 01 April 2003.