Chamber and committees

The National Framework for Service Change in NHS Scotland will advise on strategies to secure a sustainable configuration of health services in Scotland. It is important that the national framework should not be seen as a means of delaying planning decisions in individual board areas. The delivery of health services will not be determined by a blueprint produced in Edinburgh. Theintention is to create a synergy between local decisions and the national framework that will bring about the appropriate and necessary changes in the health service.

The National Framework for Service Change in NHS Scotland is currently expected to report in March 2005. Its remit is not confined to acute services and it will aim to promote opportunities for local access to services to balance the needfor increased specialisation of services.

The information is shown in the following table:

Year	Royal Infirmary	Royal Infirmary, Little France
1998	29,047	-
1999	30,406	-
2000	31,512	-
2001	32,057	-
2002	30,157	853
2003	9,739	20,959

I refer the member to the answer given to question S2W-9228 answered on 14 July 2004 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/webapp/search_wa.

The information is shown in the following table:

Year	St John’s Hospital
1998	12,765
1999	13,174
2000	13,580
2001	13,858
2002	14,156
2003	14,387

As a rule, the Scottish AmbulanceService takes emergency patients to the nearest accident and emergency department,unless otherwise specified by the local NHS board. In some circumstances, the ambulancecrew may decide to take a patient to a different unit that specialises in dealingwith the patient’s condition.

 Each Scottish Ambulance ServiceDivision is represented on the service re-design committees operating in their areas.This provides for the ambulance service to be involved in considering possible servicechanges at an early stage. These arrangements are entirely compatible with the principlesof partnership working within NHSScotland. The need for such early engagement isalso emphasised in the Department’s recently issued HDL (2004) 33 entitled Clarificationof Finance (Revenue) Arrangements Relating to the Scottish Ambulance Service.

Annual population estimates areat present only available for local authority and health board areas, although plansare well advanced to prepare small area estimates (which would allow the productionof figures by Scottish parliamentary constituency). Results from the 2001 Census,published by the Registrar General on 25 March last year, show that for these parliamentaryconstituencies the resident population was:

Parliamentary Constituency	Resident Population
Edinburgh Pentlands	77,820
Edinburgh West	79,851
Linlithgow	71,371
Livingston	87,343

 

The latest population projections,published by the Registrar General on 25 February this year, show the projectedpopulation growth in the City of Edinburgh local authority area to be just under two per cent between2003 and 2013.

More detailedinformation is available, up to the year 2018, from the General Register Officefor Scotland’s website at:

http://www.gro-scotland.gov.uk/grosweb/grosweb.nsf/pages/02population-projections-scottishareeas.

Sub-national projections areonly available for local authority and health board areas. The latest, 2002-based,population projections up to the year 2018 are available from the General RegisterOffice for Scotland’s website at:http://www.gro-scotland.gov.uk/grosweb/grosweb.nsf/pages/02population-projections-scottishareas.

NHS boards are accountable, throughministers, to the Parliament and thus ultimately to the public. The board of NHSLothian has four local authority elected members appointed as non executivedirectors and meetings of the board are open to the public.