Chamber and committees

Our ‘Beating Cancer: Ambition and Action’ strategy and the accompanying £100 million investment over 5 years, serves as a blueprint for the future of cancer services in Scotland, improving the prevention, detection, diagnosis, treatment and aftercare of people affected by all cancers. This work links with our tobacco control strategy and the Prevention of Obesity Route Map as we know that smoking and obesity are two of the biggest risk factors for renal cancer.

Prescribers of any medication, to anyone, are required to explain the rationale for prescribing, the benefits, and the side effects.

NICE clinical guidelines [CG28] cover depression in children and young people, and contain guidance on the use of antidepressants. Information about known-side effects of prescribed medication can be found on the website of the Medicines And Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, at www.gov.uk/mhra.

The Scottish Government remains committed to undertaking improvements on the A720, including at Sheriffhall. We continue to progress the option assessment process to identify a preferred option for the grade separation of Sheriffhall roundabout. I refer the member to the answer provided for S5W-00568 on 17 June 2016 for further information.

All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at:

Transport Scotland, on behalf of the Scottish Government, maintains a multi-modal model of traffic data which covers the area serviced by the A720. Traffic information is obtained from 39 automatic traffic counters which are located along the route. Information from this model can assist in forecasting future traffic demand on the region’s major roads.

Links workers undergo a robust selection process to ensure they can work autonomously, are able to work with patients who have complex issues and prevent issues from being bounced back to the GP. The existing Links Workers funded by the Scottish Government come from a range of backgrounds including community development, nursing and some have counselling qualifications. Training and learning needs are included in their personal development plans and reflect the needs of the patients that Links Workers find themselves working with. This may include ASIST, Safetalk, Scotland’s Mental Health First Aid, motivational interviewing as well as other mandatory training.

The requirements and content of the GP training curricula is a matter for the Royal College of General Practitioners, and is approved by the General Medical Council as regulator of the medical profession. This approach applies to the training requirements of the other health care professions.

The Scottish Government has no plans to seek changes to GP and other Primary Care sector training about ensuring parity of access to treatment between mental and physical health, as current training already emphasises equal importance to mental and physical illness and is not discriminatory. NHSScotland Health Boards together with general practice providers are, responsible for the provision of treatment.

Within this additional funding £15 million has also been made available through the Mental Health Innovation Fund during 2015-18 to develop innovative approaches to delivering mental health services.

The Scottish Government promotes evidence based practice for psychological therapies and has funded NHS Education for Scotland to publish the Matrix, which provides a summary of the information on the current evidence base for various therapeutic approaches and guidance and advice on psychological therapies services. The latest version of the Matrix was published in 2015 and includes a section on the range of treatments available.

The Matrix includes reference to individually tailored interventions drawn from a range of psychological models. The Matrix and the data tables this is based upon are available online at:

http://www.nes.scot.nhs.uk/education-and-training/by-discipline/psychology/the-matrix-(2015)-a-guide-to-delivering-evidence-based-psychological-therapies-in-scotland/the-matrix-(2015)-a-guide-to-delivering-evidence-based-psychological-therapies-in-scotland.aspx.

Scotland’s world-leading drugs strategy, the Road to Recovery, focuses on the needs of the individual and provides a range of interventions where needed to support recovery. We are now in the third phase of Road to Recovery – ensuring quality is embedded across all services in Scotland, addressing variations in practice and identifying and addressing areas for improvement. Our strategy aims to ensure that those who need treatment get it as soon as possible and we have developed a set of Quality Principles for individuals accessing alcohol and drug services to ensure that people have access to the highest quality, person centred services to enable and support their recovery.

The Scottish Government provides direct support to National Museums Scotland in Edinburgh and the National Mining Museum of Scotland in Midlothian. The Scottish Government also funds Museums Galleries Scotland to provide support to a range of local authority and independent museums and galleries across Scotland, including in the Lothians.

The Scottish Government is currently examining information provided by Health and Social Care Partnerships on use of the Integrated Care fundin 2015-16. Going forward partnerships will report on their investments and outcomes through their annual performance reports.