Chamber and committees

Scottish Government campaigns are designed to improve and save lives, and make a measurable contribution to our priorities. Campaign spend from 2004-05 onwards is published on the Scottish Government website at: http://www.gov.scot/About/People/Directorates/Communications/advertising-marketing/spend.

For details of campaign spend prior to 2004-05 I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-03693 on 4 September 2007. 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

Scottish Government manage and monitor the quality and capacity of trains that ScotRail is required to deliver through the franchise agreement at regular meetings.

Rail services serving Musselburgh and Wallyford station are operated with Class 380 trains which were introduced in 2010 and delivered many passenger benefits such as Wi-Fi, accessible toilets, wheelchair spaces, cycle spaces and power sockets. The on-train facilities are monitored to assess the condition under the Service Quality Incentive Regime, and where standards fail to meet the prescribed level of service, penalties are levied against the franchisee.

With regard to capacity, an investment of £475 million in train improvements is being made resulting in more trains, more seats and more services across Scotland. By early 2018 the new longer, greener, quicker Class 385 trains will serve communities in East Lothian. On peak services when the new six car Class 385 replace Class 380 trains, more than 40% extra seats will be provided. From now until then, ScotRail are committed to ensuring they lay on as much capacity as possible from their current rolling stock to meet passenger demand.

Obtaining informed consent, which is primarily a matter for clinicians working in NHS Scotland and their patients, can only be achieved through partnership and joint decision making. The General Medical Council (GMC) has produced comprehensive guidance, Good Medical Practice and Consent: patients and doctors making decisions together. This sets out the principles on which good clinical decisions should be based. It also provides a framework for good practice that covers the various situations that doctors may face in the course of their work. The guidance can be found at: http://www.gmcuk.org/guidance/ethical_guidance/consent_guidance_how_guidance_applies_to_you.asp

The Scottish Government expects all NHS boards and their clinicians to adhere to the GMC guidance and to have clinical governance arrangements in place to ensure that the principles and framework contained in the guidance are applied by all doctors when seeking informed consent to treatment from patients.

It is for independently contracted practices to decide how best to communicate with their patients. There are no current plans to introduce a national text appointments service. Decisions at practice or NHS board level allow solutions to integrate with existing processes and systems, and to be responsive to local circumstances.

The Scottish Government outlined plans on 11 March 2016 to provide £2 million additional funding to improve or upgrade IT infrastructure in GP practices as part of a £20 million package for GPs to ease pressures on the workforce over the next year. This is in addition to the primary care digital services delivery fund, announced in June 2015, which is providing £6 million over three years to improve access to GP digital and online services, enhance GP systems, and encourage innovation and research in GP digital services.

The vast majority of Scotland’s health statistics are collected and published in accordance with the UK National Statistics Code of Practice. National Services Scotland (through Information Services Division) is the main producer of Scottish health statistics.

The UK statistics authority works in partnership with amongst others, the Scottish Government’s Chief Statistician and the Head of Profession at National Services Scotland, to ensure compliance against this code. The code emphasises key aspects of quality and the Scottish Government welcomes the assurance that this provides to all users of Scottish health statistics.

The statisticians and data experts involved in the collection, analysis and publication of health statistics work closely with users of their statistics. User feedback is welcomed and is important to the continuous improvement agenda that is key to the work of those producing Scotland’s health statistics.

The Scottish Government does not hold this information for independently contracted practices. It does expect patients to be offered an appointment with a member of GP practice staff within two days; the latest figures (Health and Care Experience Survey 2015-16) show that nearly 92% of people were able to get a consultation within that time.

The figures on the percentage of patients able to arrange an appointment with a member of GP practice staff within two days by board are given in the following table:

Health board	Percentage of patients able to access healthcare professional within two working days
NHS Ayrshire And Arran	90.7
NHS Borders	92.9
NHS Dumfries And Galloway	95.8
NHS Fife	90.7
NHS Forth Valley	91.4
NHS Grampian	90.7
NHS Greater Glasgow And Clyde	92.3
NHS Highland	94.4
NHS Lanarkshire	89.0
NHS Lothian	91.5
NHS Orkney	97.8
NHS Shetland	95.2
NHS Tayside	94.3
NHS Western Isles	95.2
NHS Scotland	91.8

Figures broken down by GP practice are held at the following website: http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Health/GPPatientExperienceSurvey/HACE2015-16/LDP-GP

Patients are not referred under the terms of the European Cross-border Healthcare Directive. They are exercising an EU Treaty right that allows them to travel throughout the European Economic Area (EEA) to receive treatment that is the same as or equivalent to treatment that is provided by the state in their home country, and to be reimbursed on return to that country.

The home healthcare provider has no responsibility for the quality, safety, outcome or governance of the treatment sought in another part of the EEA. In considering reimbursement (which is restricted to the amount the treatment would have cost if it had been provided by the state at home) the home healthcare provider - in Scotland the relevant NHS board - must ensure that the treatment was medically necessary and that prior authorisation has been agreed (if the patient travelled for specialist treatment). The NHS board must also be satisfied with the supporting documentation from the country of treatment, before reimbursement can be paid. Scotland's European Cross-border Healthcare National Contact Point, administered by NHS inform, provides further guidance on the operation of the directive at: http://www.nhsinform.co.uk/rights/europe/.

The directive was transposed in October 2013, although since then Cross-border healthcare activity has been modest. The 14 local NHS boards would be best placed to provide numbers for both outgoing and incoming patients who have used the Directive to travel in the EEA for treatment.

Information on administrative services staff from 1999 can be found on the workforce statistics web site at: http://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Workforce/Historic-Data/WFG01_HB_REG.xls

The following tables shows the number of people from Scotland who have received treatment in hospitals in other parts of the UK in each year since 1999. The data across the UK is not directly comparable due to differences in data definitions.

Information is provided in the following table on the number of finished admission episodes for patients resident in Scotland who have received healthcare from the NHS in England since 1999.

Year	Finished Admission Episodes
1999-2000	5,427
2000-2001	5,804
2001-2002	5,628
2002-2003	5,851
2003-2004	6,548
2004-2005	6,998
2005-2006	7,378
2006-2007	7,518
2007-2008	7,371
2008-2009	7,326
2009-2010	7,671
2010-2011	7,811
2011-2012	7,574
2012-2013	7,449
2013-2014	7,201
2014-2015	7,020

Source: Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), NHS Digital (England)

Information is provided in the following table on the number of patients resident in Scotland who have received healthcare from the NHS in Wales since 1999.

Year	Patients
1999-2000	145
2000-2001	164
2001-2002	146
2002-2003	171
2003-2004	152
2004-2005	132
2005-2006	140
2006-2007	164
2007-2008	154
2008-2009	137
2009-2010	119
2010-2011	107
2011-2012	147
2012-2013	132
2013-2014	128
2014-2015	102

Source: Patient Episode Database Wales (PEDW), NHS Wales Informatics Service

Information is provided in the following table on the number of patients resident in Scotland who have received healthcare from the NHS in Northern Ireland since 1999.

Year	Patients
1999	127
2000	95
2001	95
2002	110
2003	87
2004	104
2005	100
2006	83
2007	98
2008	118
2009	99
2010	80
2011	75
2012	87
2013	95
2014	102
2015P	115

Source: Hospital Inpatient System, Northern Ireland Health Department

^P -Provisional

The Scottish Government has agreed with Scottish General Practitioners Committee to begin extracting data this transitional year (01 April 2016 to 31 March 2017). This has two purposes:

The creation of an anonymised extraction process at a practice cluster level will support quality improvement activities across a group of practices within a cluster.

The creation of an anonymised extraction process will support service planning and delivery in the new integrated partnerships.

This extraction of patient information follows the abolition of the quality of outcomes framework and will begin towards the end of September 2016.