Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government expects NHS boards to have well-structured transition arrangements in place, which meet the needs of their local population, regardless of where in Scotland the young person lives, as outlined in Better Health, Better Care: Hospital Services for Young People in Scotland published on 5 May 2009.

Additionally, The Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014 contains duties and provisions in relation to developing and delivering statutory Child’s Plans. Guidance will be developed to support transition throughout the life course within and between services for children that require a Childs Plan. It is good practice for the Child’s Plan to proactively plan for transition and the management of transition. Health boards and partners will be required to develop policies, procedures and practice to meet the duties and provisions prior to them coming into force.

The National Clinical Strategy sets out why the NHS in Scotland needs to adapt in the face of increasing and changing demand, along with significant constraints in terms of workforce and finances. The strategy sits alongside the Health and Social Care Integration and GIRFEC to ensure that there is a comprehensive approach to both improving the health of the population, and the healthcare available.

Its foundation is to provide care as locally as possible through a whole-team, community-based approach which is vital to the future of the NHS, allowing people to continue to be treated close to home, or in their home, in the majority of cases.

The Scottish Government expects NHS boards to respond to the physical and mental health needs of their population. To assist in providing effective, evidence-based treatments, the Scottish Government provides funding to NHS Education for Scotland (NES) to host the ‘The Matrix: A Guide to Delivering Evidence-based Psychological Therapies in Scotland’, an evidence-based guide for NHS boards on effective psychological treatments for a range of mental health issues, including depression and anxiety, which people with effects from inflammatory bowel disease may experience.

Crohn’s and Colitis UK’s report ‘Scotland Leading The Way: a National Blueprint for Inflammatory Bowel Disease in Scotland’, launched with the support of the Scottish Government in June 2016, also contains best practice recommendations related to improving psychological support for IBD patients.

The National Clinical Strategy is the Scottish Government’s blueprint for health and social care over the next 15 years. It’s one of the key drivers that will help deliver transformational change across our NHS.

Its foundation is to provide care as locally as possible through a whole-team, community-based approach which is vital to the future of the NHS, allowing people to continue to be treated close to home, or in their home, in the majority of cases.

The National Clinical Strategy sets out why the NHS in Scotland needs to adapt in the face of increasing and changing demand, along with significant constraints in terms of workforce and finances. The National Clinical Strategy sits alongside the Health and Social Care Integration and GIRFEC to ensure that there is a comprehensive approach to both improving the health of the population, and the healthcare available.

The Scottish Government has supported and funded Crohn’s and Colitis UK in the production of “Scotland Leading the Way - a National Blueprint for Inflammatory Bowel Disease in Scotland”, which seeks support NHS Boards in improving care and treatment for all people living with inflammatory bowel disease in Scotland.

Work is underway to plan for implementation of the recommendations in The Best Start. We will take this planning work forward in partnership with boards, including the Scottish Ambulance Service to develop a comprehensive understanding of the resource implications of the recommendations.

The Scottish Ambulance Service, through funding from the Scottish Government and NHS boards, deliver the ScotSTAR (Scottish Specialist Transport and Retrieval) Service. The service undertakes all neonatal transfers providing a safe and dedicated transport service for a group who, because of their clinical condition, may require an augmented clinical team during transport.

SIGN guidelines are distributed within the NHS in Scotland via a network of Guideline Distribution Coordinators in each NHS board. Implementation is the responsibility of each individual NHS board and local ownership of the implementation process is crucial to success in changing practice.

It is not possible to answer, from centrally held information, whether SIGN guidance has directly led to a change in venous thromboembolism (VTE) incidence, the collective name for Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT) and Pulmonary Embolism (PE).

It is for NHS boards to plan and deliver clinical services and ensure that they have the correct staff in place to meet the needs of their services and ensure high quality patient care. As part of this we expect them to have robust workforce plans and recruitment and retention policies in place which take account of health visitor vacancies and retirements.

In addition the Scottish Government has committed to delivering an additional 500 Health Visitors by 2018, and we have invested £3.3 million since 2014 to support additional training.

The information relating to which hospitals do not have dedicated transition services from paediatric to adult care is not centrally held.

The Scottish Government expects NHS boards to have well-structured transition arrangements in place, which meet the needs of their local population, regardless of where in Scotland the young person lives.

The national policy regarding age appropriate hospital care for children and young people was outlined in Better Health, Better Care: Hospital Services for Young People in Scotland published on 5 May 2009. The national policy considered the importance that transfer from paediatric to adult services should be the culmination of a period of planned transition care and emphasises the need for good transition arrangements for young people moving into the adult care sector across all specialities.

The Scottish Government has supported and funded Crohn’s and Colitis UK in the production of “Scotland Leading the Way - a National Blueprint for Inflammatory Bowel Disease in Scotland”, which seeks support NHS boards in improving care and treatment for all people living with inflammatory bowel disease in Scotland.

The Blueprint makes a number of recommendations for NHS boards in relation to the care of treatment and young people and including the need to have standardised transition to adult services.

The Scottish Government expects NHS boards to have well-structured transition arrangements in place, which meet the needs of their local population, regardless of where in Scotland the young person lives.

The national policy regarding age appropriate hospital care for children and young people was outlined in Better Health, Better Care: Hospital Services for Young People in Scotland published on 5 May 2009. The national policy considered the importance that transfer from paediatric to adult services should be the culmination of a period of planned transition care and emphasises the need for good transition arrangements for young people moving into the adult care sector across all specialities.

The Scottish Government has supported and funded Crohn’s and Colitis UK in the production of “Scotland Leading the Way - a National Blueprint for Inflammatory Bowel Disease in Scotland”, which seeks support NHS Boards in improving care and treatment for all people living with inflammatory bowel disease in Scotland.

The Blueprint further reinforces the need makes a number of recommendations specific to this area. A number of trials have taken place across Scotland including virtual and telephone clinics, the trial has meant that patients can avoid long journeys to physical clinics, also ensuring the necessary care could be provided in the appropriate timescale to support the patient.

Healthcare Improvement Scotland funded the SAPPHIRE (Social Science APPlied to Healthcare Improvement REsearch) group at University of Leicester to carry out an independent evaluation of the sepsis VTE collaborative. The evaluation report was published in 2015 and is available on the Scottish Patient Safety Programme website: (http://www.scottishpatientsafetyprogramme.scot.nhs.uk). Information on the breakdown of results by NHS board is not held centrally.

The need for more access to support, including peer support, is one of the key themes of the “Gaun Yersel” Self Management strategy. The strategy was written by the Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland (the ALLIANCE) for the Scottish Government from the perspective of people with lived experience of long term conditions, including inflammatory bowel disease.

Through the Scottish Government funded Self Management Fund (which is administered by the ALLIANCE), 24 projects with peer support elements were funded a total of £1.7million during 2013 to 2015. The Scottish Government has committed £2million annually for the three year phase of the Fund (to run from April 2016 - March 2019) and to date £2million has been allocated to projects with peer support elements, of this £613,818 is dedicated to projects that involve young people and peer support.