- Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 17 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 1 October 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive how it plans to provide new drugs where clinically appropriate as stated in the health and community care section of Building a Better Scotland - Spending Proposals 2003-06: What the money buys.
Answer
Substantial additional resources are being made available to the NHS in Scotland over the years of the spending review as announced on 12 September 2002, with an average annual increase of 8.7% over the years 2003-04 to 2005-06 rising to £8.6 billion a year by the end of the period. Within these substantially increased resources, NHS boards are responsible for ensuring that patients residing in their areas have access to clinically appropriate treatment, including new drug treatments. At Scottish level, the Health Technology Board for Scotland reviews new drug treatments and provides guidance on their use. NHSScotland is expected to take account of advice and evidence from the HTBS and ensure that recommended drugs or treatments are made available to meet clinical need. At local level, Area Drug and Therapeutic Committees are responsible for giving advice to clinicians and for ensuring consistent application of national and local guidelines.
- Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 17 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 1 October 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive how much it has contributed financially to adopting medical advances since 1999-2000; whether it will give examples of instances where any such advances were most beneficial to the extent that they are now used or have been put in place by every NHS board, and how much funding it will allocate to the future adoption of medical advances in each year to 2005-06.
Answer
The national clinical effectiveness organisations, for example the Health Technology Board Scotland, the Scottish Inter-Collegiate Guidelines Network and the Clinical Standards Board for Scotland, are funded to evaluate the clinical and cost effectiveness of health technologies and develop evidence-based clinical guidelines and standards. NHSScotland is expected to take account of advice and evidence from these organisations so that effective medical advances are quickly adopted as mainstream practice across Scotland. NHS boards are expected to allocate their funds so as to meet national and local priorities, including taking account of clinical advances where relevant. NHS boards' allocations for future years will be announced around the turn of the year, and we expect those to be sufficient to meet pay and price increases and clinical advances.
- Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 17 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 1 October 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive what research has been carried out or commissioned to compare Scotland's health provision with European levels over the next three years and whether it will publish any such research.
Answer
The Scottish Executive do not currently have plans to commission research of this nature. A study to compare health care systems in the United Kingdom with seven other countries (mostly European) was commissioned by HM Treasury and published in April 2002. The report,
Health care systems in eight countries: trends and challenges, is available at:
- Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 17 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 1 October 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of the increased health budget to 2005-06 announced by the Minister for Finance and Public Services on 12 September 2002 will be (a) given to NHS institutions and (b) provided for initiatives outwith NHS institutions such as increasing physical activity, or reducing food-borne illness.
Answer
Detailed decisions have not yet been made on the distribution of the health budget announced on 12 September.
- Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 17 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Mary Mulligan on 1 October 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive by what percentage it will reduce food-borne illness in Scotland as part of the UK 20% reduction target by 2006 as stated in the health and community care section of Building a Better Scotland - Spending Proposals 2003-06: What the money buys and what funding it will allocate in each year to 2005-06 to achieve this target.
Answer
The Food Standards Agency have advised me that they are committed to reducing food-borne illness in Scotland by at least 20%, by 2006.The funding allocated to reduce food-borne illness across the spending review period is:
| 2003-04 | £1.4 million |
| 2004-05 | £4.1 million |
| 2005-06 | £3.9 million |
- Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 17 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 1 October 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive how much of the money allocated to health announced by the Minister for Finance and Public Services on 12 September 2002 will be allocated to other portfolios under health improvement initiatives.
Answer
Building a Better Scotland indicated additional resources of £23, 50 and 100 million towards health improvement initiatives. £18, 44 and 61 million of this has been allocated to portfolios other than health but for clarity has not been included in the health portfolio allocation.
- Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 22 August 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 30 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it currently publishes or holds information on how alternatives to the Arbuthnott funding formula, for example derivatives of the Scottish Health Authorities Resource Equalisation, are calculated and whether it has any plans to detail how the allocations were calculated when announcing future funding for NHS board or trust level initiatives.
Answer
We do not have information about alternatives to the Arbuthnott formula. NHS boards are provided with figures for their allocations and will be given any additional information which they wish to obtain about the basis of the calculations.
- Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 04 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 30 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive which NHS board or trust or agency each nurse currently employed by the NHS 24 pilot programme in Grampian worked for in their most recent job prior to employment with the pilot programme.
Answer
The information requested by the member is currently being collated by NHS 24 and I am awaiting a response. Once complete, I will write to the member with a full response and place a copy in the Parliament's Reference Centre.
- Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 16 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Mary Mulligan on 30 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive what considerations it has given to any pressure on the nursing workforce as a result of (a) the establishment of nurse-led clinics, (b) increasing the responsibilities of nurses to enable them to write prescriptions, (c) any specialisation within the nursing profession and (d) proposals for one nurse on each ward to become a "cleanliness champion".
Answer
We are taking positive steps on a number of fronts to increase capacity, enhance career development opportunities and retain the current nursing workforce.Facing the Future, the Report of the National Convention on Recruitment and Retention in Nursing and Midwifery, identified the need to make an explicit connection between supply and demand, planning and distribution and the mix and diversity of nurses and midwives. In partnership, we are working to ensure that career development opportunities within Scotland are fostered and expanded.The Scottish Executive is also committed to recruiting more nurses in NHSScotland. Over the next five years 10,000 more nurses and midwives will qualify in Scotland, 1,500 more than previously planned and a raft of other initiatives have been put in place to ensure that NHSScotland recruits and retains the number of nurses it needs.Like other health care professionals, nurses and midwives want to take the opportunity for personal and professional development to enable NHSScotland to meet the demands of developing more flexible, needs-driven services in partnership with the public and fellow health professionals including innovative approaches to care. Support for staff to do so is provided through appropriate educational opportunities and through workforce planning so that individuals can follow career opportunities. Nurses and midwives themselves seek opportunities to establish nurse-led clinics focussing on the delivery of patient centred care. The benefits for nurses include the opportunity to expand their skills and knowledge, being able to take autonomous clinical decisions and enabling patients to experience a smooth transition through their pathway of care. When developing nurse-led clinics it is important that cognisance is taken of the implications of changes to workload within the wider multi professional team. As part of the new arrangements set out in Working for Health, the workforce development action plan for NHSScotand, workforce officers will have local responsibility in their NHS board for ensuring that effective integration of service planning and workforce development takes place at trust and board level in order that services can be delivered in the most appropriate way. Nurses have been at the forefront of seeking the opportunity to prescribe as part of the care they provide in the areas of minor ailments, minor injuries, health promotion and palliative care. Appropriate training is being provided and will ensure that nurse prescribing brings real benefits in terms of access to care for patients. Some nurses seek to develop a specialist role within a given clinical field. A specialist nurse will have successfully completed a post qualification course of study in a specific clinical field and be able to apply a level of judgement, discretion and decision making in clinical care to improve the quality of patient care, meet the needs of patients within the speciality and in the specific area of practice. The development of these roles also requires a workforce development approach. The role of cleanliness "champions" has been planned in partnership with NHS boards and trusts to ensure that it fits with the clinical environment and existing infection control structures with appropriate support mechanisms being put in place. An education programme is currently being developed by NHS Education for Scotland, which will ensure that individual nurses are well prepared for the role.
- Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 16 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 27 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive whether information is held centrally on the number of patients treated in nurse-led out-patient clinics (a) in each NHS board area and (b) across Scotland as a whole in each of the last five years and what the reasons are for the position on the matter.
Answer
Earlier this year, ISD Scotland, in collaboration with Audit Scotland, carried out a week-long audit of non-in-patient clinics held in Scotland. Preliminary results from parts of the survey on nurse-led clinics are available at:
http://www.show.scot.nhs.uk/isd/isd_services/NHSiS_services/Data_quality/nurse_led_clinics.docSystematic information on the number of patients treated in nurse-led out-patient clinics is not available centrally. However, this survey is part of the work being undertaken to identify the potential advantages of collecting information about out-patient contacts other than those by consultants.
