Chamber and committees

As well as a sight test, a routine NHS eye examination in Scotland provides a comprehensive eye health assessment, tailored to meet the needs of the patient. This helps with early detection of a range of sight-threatening conditions and some general medical conditions.

Where the optometrist suspects the patient has a sight-threatening condition, where clinically appropriate they will refer the patient to the hospital eye services. Data on such referrals can be found in the Public Health Scotland report referred to in answer to question S6W-33638 on 27 January 2025.

All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

Scottish Government does not hold information centrally on public transport to health facilities.

The Scottish Government's Transport to Health delivery plan aims to ensure access to healthcare facilities is fully considered within regional and local planning, including planning for our rural communities.

Our vision is that all disabled people can travel with the same freedom, choice, dignity and opportunity as other citizens. The Accessible Travel Framework launched in 2016, is focused on improving the overall journey experience for disabled people by removing the barriers which prevent them travelling.

The delivery plan for 2024-2026 has been published in early October 2024. This covers delivery for the final two years of the Framework, and includes Transport to Health as a workstream.

This information is not held by the Scottish Government. You should contact the Scottish Ambulance Service directly.

The Scottish Government considers the varying needs of all parts of our population when developing plans and strategies, including the needs of people living in rural and island areas. We recognise that our rural and island communities have specific, place-based needs when it comes to the effective delivery of public services, including healthcare.

That is why we have established an NHS Board-led working group which is considering ways to improve delivery of safe, quality and sustainable healthcare services across rural and island Scotland.

More broadly, work is underway to develop a systematic approach to mainstreaming rural policy, the Rural Assessment Toolkit, which will support identifying and addressing the needs of rural communities and economies in our work.

Under the Islands Act 2018, the Scottish Government has a duty to consider issues that affect island communities in the development and delivery of all policies, strategies and services. We are also working with island communities and local authorities to develop a new National Islands Plan to be published later this year.

These workstreams support our endeavours to meaningfully improve outcomes for our rural and island communities across portfolios.

The requested information on what percentage of healthcare staff currently working in rural areas are locum staff, broken down by NHS board is not centrally held.

The Scottish Government have a number of initiatives already in place to attract healthcare professionals to rural areas, including Aberdeenshire.

On 30 October, the Scottish Government published the Transport to Health delivery plan which sets out commitments against transport and healthcare across the work of Health and Social Care and Transport Scotland. The plan was informed by the 2019 Transport to health and social care report prepared by the Mobility and Access Committee for Scotland (MACS) on behalf of Ministers.

As set out in the plan, we will support Regional Transport Partnerships to develop their own plans around Transport to Health. An example of this will be continuing to support the work of the Health and Transport Action Plan led by NESTRANS and partners in Aberdeenshire.

Transport Scotland have included Transport to Health as one of seven thematic workstreams in their approach for delivery of the Accessible Travel Framework.

Throughout NHS Scotland, patients who require urgent or emergency surgery will always be given clinical priority as determined by the clinicians involved in their treatment and care.

In the event that a patient requires transport to an appropriate facility for treatment, there are several resources available including the Scottish Ambulance Service’s patient transport service for scheduled care, or emergency ambulance for life threatening incidents. Scotland’s rural communities are also supported by air assets from the Scottish Ambulance Service (helicopters in Inverness and Glasgow), Scottish Charity Air Ambulance (helicopters in Aberdeen and Perth) and HM Coastguard helicopters based at Prestwick, Inverness, Stornoway and Sumburgh in Shetland.

This year we invested £30m which is driving targeted action to address the longest delays. This will see around 24,000 New Outpatient Appointments and Inpatient/ Day-Case procedures as well as over 40,000 diagnostic procedures. The funding has included diagnostic services in NHS Grampian, NHS Shetland and NHS Orkney.

We have already invested £30 million to reduce waiting lists that built up throughout the pandemic. This funding is being targeted at a series of national and local plans to reduce backlogs by maximising the use of local and national resources across Scotland. As part of this, we have allocated additional funding to Gynaecology services which we expect to deliver around 3,500 new outpatient appointments.

The Budget we set out on 4 December 2024 will throw the weight of the government behind performance improvements with almost £200 million to reduce waiting lists and help support reduction of delayed discharge. By March 2026, we expect no one to be waiting longer than 12 months for a new outpatient, inpatient treatment or day case treatment.

With regards to the average wait times across all boards compared with waiting times in rural areas such as Aberdeenshire, this information requested is not held centrally by the Scottish Government the member may wish to contact NHS Grampian directly for information.