Chamber and committees

All specialist cleft surgery - for both adults and children, to repair cleft lip and palate should be carried out by one of three specialist cleft surgeons, based in Glasgow and Edinburgh.

Should the recommendation to consolidate cleft surgery in Glasgow be supported, this arrangement will continue. Patients will continue to be assessed by the national specialist cleft surgery service. Those who do not require a specialist cleft surgery intervention, will continue to be managed locally, including at St John’s Hospital in West Lothian.

A decision whether to approve the recommendation will be made in due course.

The running costs for the NHS Scotland Confidential Alert Line (NCAL) pilot (2 April 2013 to 31 July 2014) were £18,666. The running costs for the period 1 August 2014 to 31 July 2016 were £31,600.

Public Concern at Work, the charity that provides the NCAL service were awarded £120,660 in total from 2 April 2013 to 31 July 2016 to cover a range of services including whistleblowing training for NHS Sotland staff, reporting, communication and running costs of the NCAL.

The Scottish Government published the Waste Prevention and Re-use Guide which provides practical advice and guidance on implementing effective waste prevention systems within NHS facilities and includes guidance on clinical waste. It is aimed at hospital and healthcare staff including senior management, waste management officers, sustainability officers and any others interested in promoting resource efficiency in a healthcare environment.

Data on the number of Patient Hygiene Inspectors in NHS Scotland is not collated or held centrally by the Scottish Government or NHS National Services Scotland.

Information on staff outsourced from private companies is not centrally held.

The information requested is not held by the Scottish Government.

The Scottish Government has taken forward a range of actions through Changing Scotland's Relationship with Alcohol: A Framework for Action. This includes improved substance misuse education in schools through Curriculum for Excellence and improved identification of, and support for, children affected by parental substance misuse. Also, support for diversionary activities for young people and guidance for parents and carers about young people and alcohol.

In addition the Alcohol etc. (Scotland) Act 2010 imposed a mandatory condition onto licences to have an age verification policy (Challenge 25) to make it harder for under-age drinkers to gain access to alcohol and the Air Weapons and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2015 will make it an offence to give alcohol to children or young people in a public place helping the Police to address the scourge of drinking dens.

The Scottish Government expects every public body to deliver efficiency savings of at least 3 per cent per annum. NHS Health Boards have achieved this level, and delivered efficiency savings in 2015-16 in excess of £290 million. This has been reinvested by the Health Boards in frontline services.

NHS Boards achieve efficiency savings in a wide range of areas, including those set out in NHS Scotland Efficiency and Productivity: Framework for SR10: http://www.gov.scot/Publications/2011/02/11144220/12. The Framework requires savings to be made through, amongst other means, reductions in senior management, better workforce productivity, and increased use of shared services.

Information on the number of new outpatient appointments and the number of Did Not Attends and the rate since 1999 to 2015 is provided in the following table.

It is every patient's responsibility to keep their NHS appointment and it is important that they let the hospital know when they cannot attend. However, we also recognise that the NHS has to be flexible in helping make appointments convenient to patients.

The Scottish Government is committed to supporting health boards implement policies to reduce missed appointments such as providing reminder services through text, emails and social media. This will allow reminder services to be tailored for patients who are most likely not to attend.

Source: SMR00 ISD Scotland

Due to a number of changes in the recording and collection of school nursing data, figures published by ISD Scotland are not directly comparable between 1999 and 2016 and have been split accordingly:-

Information on school nurses from 1999 can be found on the workforce statistics web site at: http://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Workforce/Historic-Data/WFE01_HB_REG.xls

Further information on school nurses from 2007 onwards can be found on the statistics web site at: http://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Workforce/Publications/2012-11-27/Nursing_and_Midwifery_SIP_S2012.xls?52391154

Information on school nurses from 2013 onwards can be found on the statistics web site at: https://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Workforce/Publications/2016-09-06/Non-Medical_Trend_J2016.xls.