Chamber and committees

Following the closure of Huntercombe Hospital, the Scottish Government is in conversations with CAMHS Lead Clinicians and CAMHS Regional Leads about the regional provision of specialist eating disorder facilities, and community services, across Scotland.

We are clear that young people with eating disorders should be seen in accordance with clinical guidelines. We therefore announced during Eating Disorders Awareness Week 2019 that SIGN will be taking forward Scottish-specific clinical guidelines on eating disorders.

Additionally, the Taskforce on Children and Young People’s Mental Health, chaired by Dr Dame Denise Coia, is looking across clinical and community services. We know that specialist clinical services are important, but are not the whole answer regarding serious conditions such as eating disorders. Other service providers which engage with young people and their families, such as education, social work, and the third sector, are vital to providing practical and emotional support, and can help young people come forward more quickly to seek help. The Taskforce will develop a blueprint for how services, and surrounding support, can better meet the rapidly changing need that exists across Scotland.

NHS Scotland health boards have fully delegated powers in relation to employment issues and as such, boards have the freedom to determine all matters in relation to recruitment and retention. The Scottish Government works closely with Boards with recruitment efforts. We are investing over £4 million in domestic and international recruitment and retention activity over the next three years to support health boards in their efforts to recruit and retain the brightest talent from across the globe. This includes £450,000 allocated in this financial year (2018-19) to support the establishment of a dedicated international recruitment service. The International Recruitment Unit is now live and has been created to improve NHS Scotland’s resilience to target speciality areas that have been identified as at risk from EU withdrawal, alongside where there are currently recruitment challenges.

The Scottish Government, along with the rest of the UK, is advised on all aspects of screening by the UK National Screening Committee (UK NSC), an independent expert advisory group. Currently the UK NSC recommends breast cancer screening for women aged 50-70 every 3 years. The Scottish Government continues to monitor and consider all available evidence and recommendations.

In the case of women in their 30's with a family history of breast cancer, the guidelines set out in the Familial Breast Cancer Report, are followed in Scotland.

Female Genital Mutilation is completely unacceptable, and we are committed to tackling it and ending the practice for good. In the Programme for Government 2018-19, we committed to introducing a Bill which will strengthen the existing legislative framework for the protection of women and girls from FGM. We have consulted on this over the winter, and are currently analysing responses. We are continuing to implement our FGM National Action Plan which includes a commitment to ensuring women and girls who have been affected, and who are potentially affected, by FGM have access to relevant, effective and integrated services. Crucial to this will be ensuring consistent recording and reporting of FGM data to inform responsive and high quality service development, and monitoring of services. At the moment, healthcare professionals in Scotland have been asked to record the diagnosis and types of FGM together with any corrective procedures in the appropriate clinical records. The purpose of this is to help healthcare professionals recognise the condition, some of the presenting symptoms, and the services most likely to come across the condition. Our National Implementation Group is due to meet in March, and it will discuss the reporting figures further.

I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-21573 on 26 February 2019 . 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

The information on the average waiting times for access to dermatology services held centrally is for the quarter ending 30 September 2018. This data for outpatient and inpatient/day cases is set out in the following two tables.

However, due to technical issues with some Health Boards’ submission of data, there is no more recent data currently held centrally. This information is held by individual Health Boards and can be obtained directly from them.

Table 1: Unadjusted Median Waiting Time in Days for New Outpatient Dermatology appointments for quarter ending 30 September 2018

I will be meeting the BMA soon to discuss the results of this poll and other matters.

The Scottish Government is clear that that bullying and harassment in our NHS is unacceptable under any circumstances. We continue to work with our partners to create a culture where all staff feel confident they can speak up about any dignity at work issues they may have.

We have asked Boards about the mechanisms they have in place to support the reporting of bullying, to see how we can best support them if they need to strengthen their current arrangements. We are also carrying out a ‘Once for Scotland’ review of all our workforce policies, including bullying and harassment. The aim is to create a more consistent approach with simplified, improvement focused policies, which are person-centred and supportive to all those involved.

Racism of any form is unacceptable. The Scottish Government expects NHS Boards to ensure that reported incidents are taken seriously and fully investigated, in line with existing national and local policies covering employee conduct and bullying & harassment. In accordance with the Embracing Equality, Diversity and Human Rights PIN policy, individual NHS Scotland health boards also have a responsibility to carry out local monitoring and action planning, in order to reduce inequalities in the workplace, promote tolerance and minimise inappropriate behaviour related to a protected characteristic.

All health boards in Scotland report bi-annually on how they are working to tackle discrimination in the workplace. We are continuously looking to improve our approach to staff experience to better understand and respond to discrimination issues, through our staff governance monitoring processes. In doing so, we are actively working with NHS Scotland Health Boards Equality and Diversity Leads to consider how we can improve our monitoring processes .

We are committed to improving the prevention, detection, diagnosis, treatment and aftercare for all people living in Scotland who are affected by any form of cancer. This is reflected in our £100 million, 5 year national cancer strategy, ‘Beating Cancer: Ambition and Action’.

We are particularly committed to early detection, through our £42 million Detect Cancer Early Programme and national bowel screening programme. Such screening can identify pre-cancerous signs in men and women over 50, and treatment at such an early stage is usually incredibly effective.

A clinical refresh of the Scottish Referral Guidelines has been completed, based on the latest evidence and published on 22 January 2019. The revised guidelines will support primary care clinicians, including GPs, refer patients, regardless of age, that have a suspicion of cancer, allowing for earlier diagnosis and treatment and increasing their survival chances. Eight pathways were updated as part of the clinical refresh, including Lower GI which colorectal cancer falls under.