Chamber and committees

All NHS boards use national systems as follows: Payroll, SCI Store (clinical information repository), CHI (Community Health Index), National Screening Systems, SCI Gateway (clinical communication).

Full details of all other systems used by all health boards are not held centrally but the main IT systems used by each NHS board are listed in the table. Although these systems are not necessarily the same across NHS boards, where applicable they are required to be compatible and meet certain criteria. Common information standards are in place, they report on the same basis for national statistics and they are interfaced to a common infrastructure which can be configured to allow them to share data.

NHS Board	Patient Administration System	Laboratory	Radiology*	Finance	HR
Argyll and Clyde	Compas	Apex Pinnacle LabCentre	Radwyse iSoft Amersham	Cedar	Empower
Ayrshire and Arran	Compas McKesson	Apex Telepath 2000	McKesson Kodak	Cedar	Empower
Borders	iSoft	Labcentre	Amersham	Cedar	procuring
Dumfries and Galloway	Compas	Apex	Bull	Cedar	Vizual
Fife	Capula	Torex MasterLab	Kodak	Cedar	Centurion
Golden Jubilee	Capula	Labcentre	Kodak	Sage	None
Grampian	iSoft	Apex	Misys Sectra	Cedar	SWISS
Forth Valley	Compas	Apex	Mysis	Cedar	PWIS
Greater Glasgow	ISoft Meditech	Telepath	Meditech CRIS	Cedar	Empower PWA
Highland	iSoft	Pinnacle	procuring	Integra	None
Lanarkshire	iSoft	MasterLab	Amersham	Cedar	Empower
Lothian	iSoft	Labcenter iLAB	Inhouse TSS Radwise Radcentre	Cedar	PWA LOMIS
Orkney	Compas	Labcenter	Kodak	Resource	none
Shetland	Compas	Masterlab	None	Accpac	SDMS
Tayside	Compas Clinicom	Labcentre	In House	Cedar	In House
Western Isles	Compas	Medipath	Sapphire	Cedar	None

Note: *Several NHS boards are in the process of reviewing their Radiology systems as part of preparing to introduce the national PACS – digital X-Ray – system.

Nearly 60 separate awards with a total value of £1 million were made across Scotland in response to police concerns about security arrangements at places of worship following 11 September 2001. Those security improvements remain in place. Police forces across Scotland continue to concentrate considerable effort and resources, liaising with communities, to allay concerns and to identify intelligence to ensure a proactive response to these issues. All reported racist incidents are treated appropriately by the police regardless of the type or location.

This will be a matter for the newly configured health boards to consider. In general, hospital systems or departmental systems such as laboratory or radiology systems only hold data for patients treated within these settings. Where it is necessary to share information between hospitals, or between hospitals and primary care, a common infrastructure exists which allows data to be shared using the Community Health Index number. NHS boards may wish to consider whether the geographic coverage of current patient information repositories and indexes need to be changed to reflect any changes in patient care patterns. Current NHS IT infrastructure would enable such changes if required and reduce the length and cost of such an exercise which would need to be assessed locally in the light of local circumstances.

I refer the member to the answer to question S2W-18400 on 31 August 2005. 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/wa.search.

According to reports from local authorities, the percentage of schools that have adopted the integrated community schooling approach in the last three years is as follows:

Year	2002-03	2003-04	2004-05
% Integrated Community Schools	42%	64%	98%

 

This will be a matter for the newly configured NHS board to consider. Current NHS IT infrastructure would enable such changes if required and reduce the length and cost of such an exercise, the need for which would need to be assessed locally in the light of local circumstances.

The latest data available are contained in the Scottish House Condition Survey 2002. At that time it was estimated that around 286,000 households lived in fuel poverty, approximately 13% of the total housing stock. The Scottish House Condition Survey is the only source we have for reliably assessing the extent of fuel poverty in Scotland.

 The new Continuous Scottish House Condition Survey uses a much smaller annual sample-size than the 2002 Survey. For this reason, we will not be able to update the detailed fuel poverty analysis of the type contained within the 2004 Fuel Poverty report until 2007 at the earliest when we will have responses for the first three years of the survey.

Although these two NHS boards do not use exactly the same set of IT systems they have similar uses and features and are compatible. Common information standards are in place, they report on the same basis for national statistics and they are interfaced to a common infrastructure which can be configured to allow them to share data using the Community Health Index number. Moreover, two key systems are used by each NHS board: the patient record system known as SCI Store and the secure NHS Gateway which enables them to share patient information and exchange patient information with primary care under secure conditions.

I refer the member to the answer to question S2W-18397 on 29 August 2005. 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/wa.search.

It was not possible to publish details of the enhancements to the General Register Office for Scotland website along with the annual review as the review of the statistical information on the website had not then been completed. Following the completion of the review, progressive changes will be made. Changes so far include restructuring of the menu for easier use, the addition of a quick reference page and the provision of a section containing all the vital events reference tables for 1996 to 2004. It is intended to make summary weekly data on vital events available on the website by the end of October. A programme of these and other enhancements has been placed on the website at http://www.gro-scotland.gov.uk/statistics/improvements-to-statistics-area-of-website.html.