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Our Heart Disease Action Plan, Respiratory Care Action Plan and Stroke Improvement Plans recognise the importance of timely and equitable access to care for people living with chest, heart and stroke conditions. We are working closely with NHS Boards and people with lived experience, as well as our national advisory groups as we implement these strategies. We have also established a £10 million long COVID Support Fund to support NHS boards to increase the capacity of existing services, develop these into more clearly defined local pathways and provide a more co-ordinated experience for people living with long COVID.

We are aware that people living in remote and rural areas may face disparities in access to health care. To address this we are committed to publishing a Remote and Rural Workforce Strategy and have recently established a National Centre for Remote and Rural Health and Social Care.

The Scottish Government is considering all of the recommendations made as part of the Independent Review of Audiology Services in Scotland.

We will provide an update to Parliament on next steps in due course.

The Scottish Government expects that where Health Boards are aware of any patient who has been adversely affected by any poor-quality infant auditory brainstem response (ABR) assessment, the relevant Health Board follows up with the patient and their family to provide appropriate support, reassurance and advice on next steps.

The Scottish Government is currently considering all of the recommendations made as part of the Independent Review of Audiology Services in Scotland.

We will provide an update to Parliament on next steps in due course.

Care and support for people with chest, heart and stroke conditions or long COVID is being provided across the full range of services being delivered by our NHS. This includes local primary care teams, community-based rehabilitation services and referrals for further investigation delivered in secondary care settings where needed.

The Scottish Respiratory Advisory Committee identified three initial priorities for implementation of the Respiratory Care Action Plan (2021) which were; child to adult transitions, access to data and pulmonary rehabilitation. The child to adult transitions sub-group has produced recommendations which will be shared shortly. We have recently commissioned Public Health Scotland to begin scoping work to develop a respiratory audit programme, and we are working closely with services across Scotland to deliver improvements in pulmonary rehab.

We are making progress on delivery of our Heart Disease Action Plan (2021) and have recently completed a scoping exercise with cardiac rehabilitation services to identify priority areas for improvement.

Since publication of the Stroke Improvement Plan in June, the Scottish Government has appointed a Consultant Stroke Physician as Clinical Lead for Stroke to lead on its implementation. We are developing a bundle of rehabilitation measures for inclusion in the Scottish Stroke Care Audit and are also developing measures of patient experience of rehabilitation.

We have established a £10 million long COVID Support Fund to support NHS boards to increase the capacity of existing services, develop these into more clearly defined local pathways and provide a more co-ordinated experience for people living with long COVID. We made an initial £3 million available from the fund over 2022-23, and a further £3 million is being made available from the fund over this financial year.

The range of experts that have been involved in the Best Start and the Options Appraisal Process represent the leading expertise on this issue and are fully competent to reach an objective decision. I have no doubt that the process of determining where the final three units should be located was independent and robust, and can see no reason to commission a further review.

The Scottish Government published Quality Standards for Adult Hearing Rehabilitation Services in 2009 which sets out a standard for the repair being carried out within 2 days of the repair service receiving the hearing aid.

It is for NHS Boards to ensure appropriate provision of a service for the timely repair of hearing aids for patients.

Health Boards are responsible for planning services to best meet the needs of their patients.

Service planning and design should take place at a local level and be informed by an assessment of the type, and level, of support required by patients who need to access those services.

The Scottish Government published Quality Standards for Paediatric Audiology Services (2009) and Quality Standards for Adult Hearing Rehabilitation Services (2009) which both state that patients (and their families in the case of children) should be given a copy of their ‘Individual Management Plan’ following visits to services.

It is for Health Boards to ensure that this takes place in line with the quality standards set out.

One of the key aims of the National Mission is to improve and save lives by ensuring that every individual has access to, and choice in the type of recovery and treatment they need. In response to the Changing Lives report published by the Drug Deaths Taskforce, the Scottish Government published a Cross Government Plan which sets out examples of how we are improving alcohol and drug services to make them more flexible, convenient, accessible and easier to navigate.

For example, we are supporting local areas further develop their assertive outreach programmes both through the implementation of the MAT standards and in other ways such as the Primary Care Alcohol Nurse Outreach Service (PCANOS), which embeds specialist harm reduction services within Deep End GP practices and supports patients in engaging with and navigating treatment services.

We are also investing in residential rehabilitation to ensure people can access help when they need it and have established an Expert Group to recommend improvements for crisis management and stabilisation.

In addition, we sponsor a number of third sector organisations which offer convenient and accessible technology-based help, advice and treatment for people with problematic drinking, for example, Scottish Families Affected by Alcohol and Drugs and We Are With You, who also provide a live web chat services which have improved engagement for many people.

We are also supporting the UK Government in developing the clinical guidelines for alcohol treatment, which were published for public consultation on 16 October 2023. The guidelines encourage more flexible and convenient interventions by using digital technologies when appropriate.