Chamber and committees

I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-08980 on 10 May 2017. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx

This information is not held centrally.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on how many on-call NHS services have been put out to private tender.

The Scottish Government funds NHS 24, a special health board, to provide the 111 service in Scotland. There is a private tender process for the 111 service in England and Wales. This does not exist in Scotland for Out of Hours Services.

This information is not held centrally.

Since the Scottish Medicine Consortium’s establishment in 2002 the usual assessment time between receipt of the pharmaceutical company’s submission and the release of advice to NHS Scotland for the majority of medicines has been 14 weeks.

Where a pharmaceutical company requests a Patient and Clinical Engagement (PACE) meeting, offers a complex patient access scheme, or includes multiple clinical studies in their submission, there is a slightly longer timeline required for assessment.

The work that has been undertaken to date has been carried out by existing members of staff as part of their normal duties. In line with usual practice, no record has been taken of the number staff who have been involved in this work or the number of hours spent on individual tasks, as there is no business need to do this.

The Scottish Government does not hold official statistics on the number of, or reason for, suspensions within NHSScotland. Specific local information will be available from individual NHSScotland Health Boards.

This information is not held centrally. Specific local information will be available from individual NHSScotland Health Boards, including details of local governance arrangements.

Prescribing of systemic antibacterials in primary care has reduced for the third year running and we continue to take forward plans to limit the threat of immunity to antibiotics and drug resistance in Scotland.

Scotland’s work on Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) is globally recognised. However, Antimicrobial Resistance is a global phenomenon and the UK is taking a cross-Government approach to tackling the problem.

As tackling AMR remains a priority and a constant challenge we are working with stakeholders through our Controlling Antimicrobial Resistance Scotland (CARS) group and Scottish Antimicrobial Prescribing Group (SAPG) in a bid to reduce inappropriate prescribing of antibiotics in all healthcare settings.

We are aware of several published studies on the cost-benefit analysis of the
C-Reactive Protein (CRP) test that have been conducted in other countries. In Scotland, whilst a pilot study of the test has been undertaken, a cost-benefit analysis has not yet been completed. However, discussions on cost-benefit of the test to NHS Scotland are currently taking place.

This is a matter for Creative Scotland. The information requested is not held centrally. I have asked the Chief Executive, Janet Archer, to respond directly to the member.