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: S3W-39812

Asked by: Dr Richard Simpson, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 23 February 2011
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 3 March 2011

To ask the Scottish Executive what discussions it has had with NHS boards regarding negligence claims in relation to cancer diagnosis in each of the last two years.

Question reference: S3W-39810

Asked by: Dr Richard Simpson, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 23 February 2011
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 3 March 2011

To ask the Scottish Executive what discussions it has had with medical defence organisations regarding negligence claims in relation to cancer diagnosis in each of the last two years.

Question reference: S3W-39774

Asked by: Dr Richard Simpson, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 22 February 2011
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 3 March 2011

To ask the Scottish Executive what steps it is taking to ensure that a visitor centre separate from formal visitor facilities in prisons is provided for support before and after formal visits.

The current focus of the Scottish Prison Service is on improving the facilities within prisons to support contact between prisoners and their families, and enable prisoners to engage with those services they will require on release. The Scottish Government is actively considering how we can build on the success of visitor centres at HMP Perth and HMP Edinburgh, with a particular focus on how they can offer opportunities for a number of statutory and voluntary agencies to reach people who would benefit from support.

Question reference: S3W-39762

Asked by: Dr Richard Simpson, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 22 February 2011
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 3 March 2011

To ask the Scottish Executive what national enhanced services are undertaken by GP practices in each NHS board area.

The following table records the NHS boards and the National Enhanced Services undertaken in 2009-10.

National Enhanced Service	Ayrshire and Arran	Borders	Dumfries and Galloway	Fife	Forth Valley	Grampian	Glasgow and Clyde
Anticoagulation Monitoring	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes		Yes
Near Patient Testing	Yes	Yes	Yes		Yes	Yes	Yes
Drug Misuse						Yes	Yes
Immediate/First Responder			Yes
Homelessness							Yes
Minor Injuries	Yes	Yes			Yes	Yes
Intrapartum care
Multiple Sclerosis
IUCD Contraception	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes			Yes
*Sexual Health
*Alcohol Misuse
*Depression

National Enhanced Service	Highland	Lanarkshire	Lothian	Tayside
Anticoagulation Monitoring	Yes	Yes	Yes
Near Patient Testing	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Drug Misuse	Yes		Yes	Yes
Immediate/First Responder	Yes
Homelessness
Minor Injuries	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Intrapartum care	Yes
Multiple Sclerosis	Yes
IUCD Contraception	Yes	Yes		Yes
*Sexual Health
*Alcohol Misuse
*Depression

Note: NHS Orkney, NHS Shetland Isles and NHS Western Isles have not supplied the relevant information. The National Enhanced Services marked * were actioned by NHS boards under the current Scottish Enhanced Services Programme (SESP).

Question reference: S3W-39448

Asked by: Dr Richard Simpson, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 08 February 2011
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 2 March 2011

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S3W-39180 by Kenny MacAskill on 7 February 2011, what steps are being taken to ensure that all non-smoking prisoners and staff are protected from passive smoking.

I have asked John Ewing, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS), to respond. His response is as follows:

Smoking by staff and prisoners is not permitted in any enclosed space on SPS property with the exception that prisoners are able to smoke in their cells.

The Prisons and Young Offenders Institutions (Scotland) Rules, Rule 31, states that no prisoner shall smoke in a prison except:

In a cell or room in which that prisoner is accommodated by him or herself or;

In a cell or room in which that prisoner is accommodated and which the Governor designates as a smoking area in accordance with a direction given by Scottish ministers or;

In the open air; in any place as Scottish ministers may specify in a direction.

Prisoners admitted to SPS establishments are subject to a cell sharing risk assessment as part of the reception process during which the prisoner can request a non-smoking cell. Where a non-smoking prisoner''s preference cannot be met immediately steps are taken to accommodate the request as soon as possible and for the position to be reviewed within 7 days.

Blair House at HMYOI Polmont, opened in November 2009 for young offenders aged under 18. Prisoners in this age group are not permitted to purchase tobacco products and therefore Blair House is a totally smoke free environment.

Question reference: S3W-39721

Asked by: Dr Richard Simpson, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 21 February 2011
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 1 March 2011

To ask the Scottish Executive what continuing professional development has been offered to midwives on educating parents on alcohol matters.

We would expect all NHS boards to ensure their staff, including midwives, have the relevant continuous professional development required to undertake their role. To support this, NHS Health Scotland has developed materials and resources to support NHS staff in delivering education and intervention in relation to alcohol matters.

As part of Alcohol Brief Intervention (ABI) HEAT target, antenatal care has been included as one of three priority settings. Work is ongoing to roll out a national training programme, led by NHS Health Scotland, to provide confident and competent practitioners in delivering ABIs. This includes a specifically tailored programme and resources for the antenatal setting.

Question reference: S3W-39719

Asked by: Dr Richard Simpson, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 21 February 2011
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 1 March 2011

To ask the Scottish Executive what progress it has made on implementing the recommendations in the report, A Fuller Life: Report of the Expert Group on Alcohol Related Brain Damage.

The majority of recommendations contained within the A Fuller Life report, published in 2004, were targeted towards local partnerships and service providers. The main recommendations for the Scottish Government were to raise awareness of alcohol-related brain damage and to support improved local service provision.

In order to help achieve this, we committed to translating the principles and recommendations of A Fuller Life and the Mind the Gaps reports into practical advice to support joined-up local delivery to improve the awareness, support and service provision for people who have both mental health and substance misuse problems. This was published in Closing the Gaps “ Making a Difference in December 2007.

Question reference: S3W-39722

Asked by: Dr Richard Simpson, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 21 February 2011
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 1 March 2011

To ask the Scottish Executive how many specialist multidisciplinary teams there are to support pregnant women with a drug or alcohol problem, broken down by NHS board.

Question reference: S3W-39446

Asked by: Dr Richard Simpson, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 08 February 2011
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 1 March 2011

To ask the Scottish Executive, in light of the report in volume 305 of The Journal of the American Medical Association, whether there will be a review of the prescription status of Bevacizamub prescribing in the NHS.

The safety of bevacizumab (Avastin) is closely monitored by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency in conjunction with other European member states and the European Medicines Agency. The recent publication in the Journal of the American Medical Association which suggested that bevacizumab was associated with an increased risk of fatal adverse effects is being assessed at European level in the context of other information relating to the balance of risk and benefits of Avastin in the treatment of cancer.

Question reference: S3W-39377

Asked by: Dr Richard Simpson, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 03 February 2011
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 1 March 2011

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has an agreement with child and adolescent mental health services on the target number of inpatient beds for children and adolescents.

We are working closely with NHS boards to ensure that the number of specialist beds matches the need and demand of children and adolescents. We are also encouraging NHS boards to develop their community based intensive outreach services in order to enable children and young people to return to their own communities at an earlier stage of their recovery.

Since 2009 the Scottish Government have invested an additional £2 million annually to support these developments which shorten the time young people have to be in hospital and free up capacity for others who require admission.

We are operating a regional model of service delivery and presently have 51 beds with plans in place to increase the size of the Dundee Unit (which serves the North of Scotland Boards) from six beds to 12 and this will take the total bed numbers in Scotland to 57.