Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government has not made an assessment of savings achieved by housing association adaptations. However we are aware of research undertaken by others both in Scotland and elsewhere in the UK that considers the evidence for potential savings to health budgets from adaptations being made to the homes older or disabled people who need them.

Since the integration of health and social care, Integration Joint Boards (IJBs) are now responsible for the planning and delivery of adaptations using budgets created by delegation and for reviewing and developing services to improve outcomes for people who require adaptations.

We have also provided £10 million directly to Registered Social Landlords this year, to assist them in providing adaptations for their tenants.

NHS Tayside have indicated that the median waiting time for a new outpatient urology appointment within NHS Tayside based on completed waits in September 2018, was 20 weeks. The Board currently have 2,077 new outpatients waiting for a Urology appointment with 671 of these having received appointment dates.

NHS Tayside are developing plans to deliver improved and sustainable access and performance. As part of their Integrated Clinical Strategy, a review of how Urology Services across the region should be provided has commenced. NHS Tayside are working with clinical teams to develop a long term sustainable plan which will deliver the capacity required to meet demand for urological services going forward. The Scottish Government has also made an additional £50 million available this year to NHS Boards with NHS Tayside receiving £3.9 million to reduce the number of patients experiencing exceptionally long waits.

Each NHS board has access to a passive immunisation medical product (Palivizumab) that can reduce the worst complications of RSV in those young children at the greatest risk of complications of RSV once they have become infected with this virus. All eligible children will be under the care of hospital based paediatricians, and therefore the use of palivizumab is determined by them on a clinical basis, in the RSV season.

The GP Recruitment and Retention fund has resulted in 57 GPs being recruited across Scotland. The funding offered by the Scottish Government enabled projects to be developed and funding to be mainstreamed.

NHS Ayrshire and Arran, Tayside and the Deep End Pioneer Scheme are all in the process of recruiting new GPs onto their fellowships programmes which proved to be highly successful under the GP Recruitment and Retention fund that health boards are now supporting them. We continue to fund the development of the Scottish Rural Medicine Collaborative that has brought together 10 Health Boards across rural Scotland and are investing a further £7.5 million this year to recruit and retain GPs.

Listed below are the numbers of GPs broken down by board that officials have been sourcing as data was not held centrally.

The Scottish Government will launch a consultation on restricting domestic advertising and promotion of e-cigarettes in early 2019. This timetable will allow for the Tobacco Products and Nicotine Inhaling Products (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2018 to come into force. These Regulations which are currently being considered in the UK Parliament cover electronic cigarette advertising and are likely to come into force in early 2019. If the UK and the EU reach a withdrawal agreement which means these EU Exit Regulations are no longer required then our consultation may begin sooner.

We do not have a single measure that captures performance against this aim, as the provision of palliative care depends on the interaction of a range of services - formal palliative care, care at home and care home services, and access to hospice and hospice-at-home services - that vary considerably in definition between local systems. Good care at end of life requires collaborative, multi-disciplinary support, which is why Integration Authorities have been given statutory responsibility for meeting this need. Integration Authorities regularly report on their progress using the 23 indicators ( https://www2.gov.scot/Topics/Health/Policy/Adult-Health-SocialCare-Integration/Outcomes/Indicators/Indicators ) that support the statutory outcomes set out in the Public Bodies (Joint Working) (Scotland) Act 2014.

The indicator currently used nationally to gauge progress on improving palliative and end of life care provision is the percentage of last six months of life spent in the community. Integration Authorities met their planned trajectory for this indicator of 88% for 2017-18, which is an increase from 86.7% since the publication of the Health and Social Care Delivery Plan in 2015-16. However, we recognise that this indicator is only a measure of place of care, rather than quality or experience of care, and is not sufficient on its own. We are working with partners in local systems and health and social care professionals to develop better measures for this aim.

Health Boards must ensure that their neonatal units are appropriately and safely staffed. All NHS boards with a neonatal unit have run the neonatal nursing workload tool in 2016 and 2017, with the exception of NHS Highland. Scottish Government officials have contacted the Executive Nurse Director of NHS Highland about their use of the neonatal workforce planning tool. We will work with NHS Highland to ensure they run the neonatal workforce planning tool and provide whatever support they require.

NHS boards run the workload tool twice daily and the output provides valuable information not only for planning staffing numbers, but to identify staffing requirements on a daily basis which takes account of the dynamic nature of services. We have committed to enshrine safe staffing in law, placing the existing nursing and midwifery workload and workforce planning tools on a statutory footing.

Bliss played a vital part in our national maternity and neonatal review, 'The Best Start: A Five Year Forward Plan for Maternity and Neonatal Care in Scotland'. Bliss are represented on the ‘Best Start’ Implementation Programme Board. The Programme Board is examining neonatal workforce and education as part of their programme of work to take forward the package of recommendations. Work is well underway to implement the recommendations contained within The Best Start review.

A full written update on progress will be available at the end of the year and will be placed in SPICe.

The Scottish Government does not hold this information centrally. Since 2016, it has been the responsibility of Integration Authorities to commission and plan specialist palliative and end of life care services and supports to meet the needs of their local population. Before 2016, this responsibility lay with Health Boards and Councils for health and social care services respectively.

Funding for specialist palliative and end of life care services is drawn from the overall funds allocated to Integration Authorities by the Scottish Government. As such, officials are unable to provide the information in the way Mr Briggs has requested.

The Scottish Government is working with the Chief Finance Officers and Chief Officers of Integration Authorities to improve clarity on financial reporting arrangements. A consolidated financial report is now provided on a quarterly basis to the Scottish Parliament's Health and Sport Committee and provides an overview of the finances of the Integration Authorities.

The additional funding provided to Boards since 2017 was allocated on a criteria based assessment process, that ensured that funding was directed to initiatives that specifically addressed patients waiting the longest in specialties with the longest waits. Boards have been required to meet milestones and trajectories that demonstrate they are reducing numbers of patients waiting, and these milestones are reviewed on an ongoing basis.

The effectiveness of funding will be measured against and determined on the basis of performance achieved in relation to the reduction of patients waiting and the degree to which sustainable solutions have been put in place to reduce demand capacity gaps. I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-18635 on 8 October 2018 for information on the key specialties being funded in 2018-19. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx .