Chamber and committees

The information requested isnot available centrally.

NHS boards are responsiblefor advertising and recruiting to fill vacant posts.

Vacancy information fortrainee doctors, junior house officers, senior house officers and registrars, isnot available centrally.

Information on consultantvacancies in NHS Scotland is published on the Scottish Health Statisticswebsite under Workforce Statistics, at www.isdscotland.org/workforce.Tables B11 and B12 show the number of consultant vacancies, broken down by NHS boardarea. Latest available figures are at 30 September 2005.

The information requested isnot available centrally.

NHS boards are responsiblefor advertising and recruiting to fill vacant posts. The Executive does notroutinely collect details on the levels of interest expressed for each vacantpost.

Statistics on convictionsare published annually by the Scottish Executive Justice Department each spring.The latest set of annual statistics on convictions published on 27 April 2006 arefor 2004-05, which predates the enactment of the Emergency Workers (Scotland)Act 2005 on 9 May 2005.

Information available fromthe Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service’s case management databaseindicates that, at 19 April 2006, a total of 290 charges under the Emergency Workers(Scotland) Act 2005 had been reported to Procurators fiscal. A breakdown of thistotal by police force area is given in the following table.

Charges under the EmergencyWorkers (Scotland) Act 2005, by Police Force Area¹

Police Force Area	Total	Charge Proved	No Final Outcome Reached1
Central	5	3	1
Dumfries and Galloway	13	6	3
Fife	17	4	9
Grampian	17	7	8
Lothian and Borders	73	32	24
Northern	6	2	-
Strathclyde	146	39	77
Tayside	13	5	7
Total	290	98	129

Note: 1. Position as at 19 April 2006.

The information requested isgiven in the following table.

Infant Deaths InScotland by Parliamentary Constituency

Three YearAverage Death Rate per 1,000 Live Births (2002-04)

Highest ten constituencies	Rate
Greenock and Inverclyde	10.78
Shetland	10.14
Glasgow Springburn	9.73
Clydebank and Milngavie	9.53
Paisley South	8.79
Coatbridge and Chryston	8.27
Dunfermline West	8.19
Glasgow Kelvin	7.59
Glasgow Cathcart	7.42
Central Fife	7.24

 

Lowest ten constituencies	Rate
Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross	1.45
Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber	1.86
Dumfries	2.14
Glasgow Rutherglen	2.25
Gordon	2.38
Linlithgow	2.47
Livingston	2.48
Hamilton North and Bellshill	2.63
Western Isles	2.78
Aberdeen South	2.79

 

This information isavailable on the NHS Scottish Health Statistics website at:www.isdscotland.org/child_breastfeeding.

The majority of patients whorequire in-patient and day case treatment, particularly the diagnosis andtreatment of coronary heart disease, are seen and treated quickly. Over 53% ofpatients treated in NHSScotland hospitals receive immediate treatment and neverjoin a waiting list. Of those whose condition does not require immediatetreatment and who are placed on a waiting list, over 40% are admitted withinone month.

Reducing waiting times forthe diagnosis and treatment of coronary heart disease is a key priority forNHSScotland, and the Executive has beensteadily reducing the maximum waiting times for angiography, angioplasty and coronaryartery bypass grafts. The national maximum waiting time for angiography wasreduced from 12 months to 12 weeks on 31 December 2002 and to eight weeks on 31 December 2004. On 31 December 2005,no patient with a guarantee had waited more than eight weeks for angiography. Thenational maximum waiting time for angioplasty and coronary artery bypass graftswas reduced from 12 months to 24 weeks on 31 December 2002 and to 18 weeks on 30 June 2004. On 31 December 2005, no patient with aguarantee had waited more than 18 weeks for angioplasty or coronary arterybypass graft.

From the end of 2007, nopatient will wait more than 16 weeks from GP referral, through a rapid accesschest pain clinic or equivalent, to cardiac intervention. Patients notpresenting with chest pain will wait no more than 16 weeks for treatment afterthey have been seen as an out-patient by a heart specialist, and the specialisthas recommended treatment.

At that point, a newapproach to defining and measuring waiting will also be introduced to replaceavailability status codes (ASCs), which have the effect at present of excludingpatients from waiting times guarantees where for example, they are medicallyunfit for treatment, where they have asked for their treatment to be postponed,or where their treatment is highly specialised or of low clinical priority. Thenew approach will be fairer, more consistent and more transparent.

Retrospective analyses ofwaiting times for hospital treatment compiled from SMR01 returns are based ondata that does not record whether patients have had an ASC applied. Informationon numbers of patients who waited more than eight weeks for angiography and 18weeks for angioplasty and coronary artery bypass grafts has been placed in the Scottish ParliamentInformation Centre (Bib. number 39535): it includes the waiting times ofpatients who have been exempted from the guarantee for the reasons given aboveand therefore overstates true waiting times. It is not possible to estimate theextent of the overstatement. The SMR3 waiting times census data, which excludespatients with ASCs, is used for target compliance purposes, and the tablesprovided also include SMR3 data for angiography, angioplasty and coronaryartery bypass graft surgery for NHSScotland from the censuses undertaken on 31December in each year since 2002.

Operations are carried outwithin NHSScotland in a wide range of settings dependent on a number of factorsincluding the complexity of the operation and the clinical and personal needsof the patient.

Trenddata showing the number of principal procedures carried out on patientsadmitted as inpatients or day cases to Scottish hospitals is given in a table PrincipalOperations carried out in NHSScotland, a copy of which has been placed inthe Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 39480).

In addition some operationsare performed in outpatient clinics. The ISD Scotland website provides detailsof available national figures. Currently it is difficult to describe andquantify accurately the level of operations carried out in outpatients. ISDScotland has been working with NHS boards to capture this information. Emergingfindings are published in ISD Scotland’s “data developments” web pages at http://www.isdscotland.org/data_development.

The information requested isgiven in two tables in a document entitled Average available staffed beds by health board area, by specialty. Acopy of this document has been placed inthe Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 39494).

The informationshown in table 1 is for the latest eight years only. Changes in the methodologyused to record specialty information were implemented from April 1996. Thesenew coding procedures (phased in during 1996-97) mean that information for theprevious years is not strictly comparable with the more recent data. Table 2shows information from 31 March 1990 to 1997 based on “old”specialty groupings; for certain specialty groups there may be discontinuitieswhen comparing figures for pre-1997-98 and post-1996-97 and trend comparisonsshould be made with caution.

The Executive does not settarget numbers for beds. These are local planning decisions taken by NHS boardswho have the information necessary to take the right decisions. There are goodreasons for bed numbers to reduce. We need fewer long-stay beds to take forwardthe policy of caring for the elderly and also for people with chronic mentalillness or with learning disability, in their homes or in other communitysettings. Medical advances continue to reduce length of stay associated withmany planned procedures and some are now routinely carried out in a few hourswithout the need for any overnight stay. And the NHS in Scotland ismaking better use of available beds. Average bed occupancy has risen from 78.5%in 1997-98 to 81.7% in 2005. But more beds are targeted where they are needed. Forexample, the number of intensive therapy unit beds is up by almost 20% over thelast five years. These are by far the most expensive beds to staff and equip.

Themajority of patients who require in-patient and day case treatment, including heartoperations and hip replacement surgery, are treated quickly. Over 53% of patientstreated in NHSScotland hospitals receive immediate treatment and never join a waitinglist. Of those whose condition does not require immediate treatment and who areplaced on a waiting list, over 40% are admitted within one month and almost 70%within three months.

The Executive has been steadilyreducing the maximum waiting time for those patients who wait longer. The nationalmaximum waiting time was reduced from  12 months to nine months on 31 December 2003 andto six months on  31 December 2005. This will be further reduced to 18 weeks from the endof 2007.  On 31 December 2005, no patient with a guarantee had waited more thansix months for a heart operation or for hip replacement surgery.

NHSScotland is making good progresstowards meeting the next key target of a maximum wait of 18 weeks by the end of2007. At that point, a new approach to defining and measuring waiting will alsobe introduced to replace availability status codes (ASCs), which have the effectat present of excluding patients from waiting times guarantees where for example,they are medically unfit for treatment, where they have asked for their treatmentto be postponed, or where their treatment is highly specialised or of low clinicalpriority. The new approach will be fairer, more consistent and more transparent.

Retrospective analyses of waiting times forhospital treatment compiled from SMR01 returns are based on data that does not recordwhether patients have had an ASC applied. Information requested on heart operationsand hip replacements has beenplaced in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 39493): it includesthe waiting times of patients who have been exempted from the guarantee for thereasons given above and therefore overstates true waiting times. It is not possibleto estimate the extent of the overstatement. The SMR3 waiting times census data,which excludes patients with ASCs, is used for target compliance purposes, and thetables provided also include SMR3 data for hip replacements for NHSScotland fromthe censuses undertaken on 31 December in each year since 1999 and for angiography,angioplasty and coronary artery bypass graft surgery for NHSScotland from the censusesundertaken on 31 December in each year since 2002.

Waiting times for cancer treatmentsequivalent to the waiting times for the other specified procedures are not availablefrom routinely collected hospital data, as complete information is not capturedon all treatment types, such as hormonal therapy and chemotherapy, and not all cancertreatments require a hospital admission.

Information on cancer waitingtimes is currently gathered through cancer audit systems in order to measure thetarget that “by December 2005 the maximum wait from urgent referral to treatmentfor all cancers will be two months” from Cancerin Scotland: Action for Change, published in 2001. Information showingperformance against the target by NHS Board of diagnosis is currently availablefor breast, colorectal, lung, ovarian, melanoma, lymphoma, urological, Upper GIand head and neck cancers and is available from the following Scottish Executive website:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Health/health/cancer/cancerwaits.