Chamber and committees

Since August 2009, all eligible nursing and midwifery students have been guaranteed a minimum income of £6,578 per year.

In addition, eligible students have had access to a range of supplementary allowances, including:

An income-assessed dependant’s allowance, where appropriate (up to £2,640 for a spouse, cohabiting partner or first child for whom a student has a legal responsibility for with little or no income from any sources; and up to £557 for each other dependent child);

£60 initial expenses;

£1,303 lone parent allowance;

Formal childcare costs (up to £1,216);

Disabled students allowances (up to £1,725 qualifying cost, up to £20,520 per annum for non-medical help and up to £5,160 for major items of specialist equipment);

Travel expenses for placements; and

Paid maternity leave.

This information is not held centrally.

(a) We do not hold any information centrally on the number of people with learning difficulties in psychiatric hospitals. However, the table below provides information on the number of inpatients discharged from psychiatric hospitals during 2013-14 with a principal diagnosis of learning disabilities.

Table 1 – Number of patients discharged from psychiatric hospitals with a principal diagnosis of learning disabilities in 2013-14, Scottish hospitals^*.

*Notes:

1. Patients are counted once in the financial year ending 31 March 2014.

2. Psychiatric inpatient activity is recorded in Scottish morbidity record 04 (SMR04). Day cases have been excluded.

3. Diagnoses can be listed in six positions, but only the principal position has been analysed here. This will not count how many inpatients have learning disabilities, but show how many were discharged with learning disabilities as a principal diagnosis.

4. Learning disabilities are defined as ICD-10 codes F70 to F79.

5. Year is defined by date of discharge.

6. Those living outside Scotland but treated within Scotland have been included.

(b) We do not hold any information centrally on the number of people with learning difficulties (or learning disabilities) in young offender institutions.

(c) We do not hold any information centrally on the number of people with learning difficulties (or learning disabilities) in prisons.

We are currently undertaking a review of the whole funding package available to nursing and midwifery students. As part of this review, we are working closely with key stakeholders including Unison, the Royal College of Nursing, the Royal College of Midwives, the National Union of Students and students across Scotland.

All eligible nursing and midwifery students are currently guaranteed a minimum income of £6,578 per year, excluding supplementary allowances.

The core element of nursing and midwifery student support in Scotland remains non-means tested and non-repayable.

It is the Scottish Government’s aim that support for nursing and midwifery students in Scotland fairly reflects the needs of a large and varied student population.

We recognise the importance of patients getting swift access to diagnostic tests and all boards have confirmed that patients with a suspicion of cancer receive their diagnostic test within two to three weeks. Whilst the numbers of patients waiting longer than six weeks has increased, the demand for these tests has also increased. This is demonstrated by the number of upper and lower gastrointestinal scopes increasing by around 19,000 from 125,000 in 2006-07 to 144,000 in 2013-14, an increase of 15%. To address some of this increase the Scottish Government has made available around £12.5 million between 2012 to 2016 specifically to support diagnostic waits.

The review of the pet vending trade including exotic animals is part of a wider review of pet welfare, which is a substantial and ongoing piece of work. Some initial meetings with stakeholders have already been held and further meetings are planned later in 2015.

Decisions on how the additional £85 million will be allocated over the next five years are still being finalised but we will be working with NHS Scotland and its partners to ensure that we get maximum benefit from the investment. However, broad areas for investment will include:

Further improvement to child and adolescent mental health services to bring down waiting times;

Improved access to services and in particular psychological therapies; and

Better responses to mental health in community and primary care settings, including promoting wellbeing through physical activity and improved patient rights.

The number of patients discharged in each financial year from Scottish hospitals with a diagnosis of eating disorders (ICD-10 code F50) in the main diagnosis position:

Table 1: The number of patients¹ under 18 years old² discharged from acute (SMR01) and psychiatric (SMR04)³ hospitals in Scotland⁴ with a main diagnosis⁵ of eating disorders⁶, 2009-10 to 2013-14.

Notes:

1. Patients are counted once within each year but may appear in more than one year. If a patient appeared in both datasets (SMR01 and SMR04) in the same year they have only been counted once.

2. Age on admission.

3. Acute inpatient and day case activity is recorded in Scottish morbidity record 01 (SMR01); psychiatric inpatient and day case activity is recorded in Scottish morbidity record 04 (SMR04). SMR01 and SMR04 are linked to allow patient based analysis across the two datasets.

4. Includes all patients treated in Scottish hospitals.

5. The SMR01 and SMR04 datasets have space to record a main diagnosis and up to five secondary diagnoses; this analysis looks at the main diagnosis position only.

6. Eating disorders are identified by ICD-10 code F50. For SMR04 records, diagnosis is recorded on admission and discharge. For this analysis, diagnosis on discharge is used as it is more accurate.

Any increase in the incidence of eating disorders is a concern.

We are committed to delivering change and improvement in child and adolescent mental health services where the majority of young people with an eating disorder will be seen. That is why we are working to deliver the range of commitments within our national mental health strategy that will benefit children and young people, including ensuring faster access to specialist services through delivery of the 18 week access target. We have invested in, and increased the child and adolescent mental health services workforce by 28.2 per cent since 2009. We have also increased the national child and adolescent mental health bed base to 48 following the opening of the new 12 bed inpatient unit at Dudhope House in Dundee.

We will also be investing further in child and adolescent mental health services from the additional £100 million which will be available over the next five years which the Scottish Government announced in two tranches in November 2014 and May 2015 to further improve mental health services in Scotland.

We launched a re-founded See Me programme in January 2014, with funding of £1 million, with a further £500,000 from Comic Relief. The programme will build on the previous work to end stigma and discrimination associated with mental health including eating disorders.

Recommendations for the management and treatment of eating disorders in Scotland was published by NHS Quality Improvement Scotland (now known as NHS Health Improvement Scotland) in 2006. The guidance places a duty on health boards to provide information and support to the patient and if appropriate their family or carer. This will include nutrition education and details of self-help groups and support groups.

The NHS Health Improvement Scotland website hosts the Scottish Mental Health First Aid programme. The programme is aimed at the general population aged 16 and over and raises awareness of a range of mental health issues. There is also a session on self-harm where eating disorders is explored including how to provide initial help.

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

On 31 March 2015, 98% of patients on the waiting list had waited less than six weeks for a CT scan. However we are not complacent and to ensure that NHS Scotland continues to deliver swift treatment for CT scans the Scottish Government invested £300,000 last year to create a new diagnostic hub at Queen Margaret Hospital in Fife to support diagnostic performance in NHS Fife, Lothian and Forth Valley. Also under this government the number of consultant clinical radiologists has increased by 36.2% from 223.5 whole time equivalent (WTE) at September 2006 to 304.5 WTE at March 2015. In the last year alone the number of consultant clinical radiologists has increased by 16.2 WTE an increase of 5.6%.