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Found 127 results
  1. News Article
    Tracey Meechan's pain from an ovarian cyst is so severe she can't bend over - she relies on her children to help her put her shoes and socks on. Every day the 41-year-old wakes up and wonders if any new symptoms are going to appear. She has been on an "urgent" NHS waiting list for surgery for 100 weeks and now feels "forgotten". As the latest NHS Scotland waiting times data is due to be published, Mrs Meechan told BBC Scotland News that the wait for treatment has affected every part of her life. She said: "I can't live my life to the fullest. I can't do the activities I want to do with my kids. I can't do the job that I love. "I was signed off work at the end of January as a home carer because of the pain and the physicality of my job - I can't do it. "My mental health has declined. This has been years and the symptoms have worsened. It's impacted my life, my personal life and my family." Before the pandemic it was rare for anybody to face a wait of a whole year to start NHS treatment, but that is not the case now. Waiting always has consequences – more frequent visits to the GP to manage pain, struggles to work or stay healthy in other aspects of life. The government says tackling waits is a priority and has set a target to create 150,000 additional appointments this year. Read full story Source: BBC News, 27 May 2025
  2. Content Article
    Operational guidance to support health boards boards undertaking perinatal adverse event reviews incorporating the additional reporting required of maternity services. See also Maternity and neonatal (perinatal) adverse event review process for Scotland: Operational guidance to supplement the HIS national framework
  3. News Article
    NHS Tayside has been formally ordered to improve maternity services at Ninewells Hospital following an unannounced inspection by a health watchdog. Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS) expanded its safe delivery of care inspections following a neonatal mortality review last year to “provide women, birthing people and families with an assessment of the quality of care” in maternity services. It carried out its first safe delivery of care inspection in an unannounced visit to maternity services at Ninewells in Dundee between 27 and 29 January this year. This was followed up with another unannounced visit on February 12 due to concerns, including that breastfeeding equipment was being cleaned in a sink with kitchen utensils, which had not been addressed at the time of the return visit. In an inspection report published on Thursday, HIS said after the revisit, “we were not assured that sufficient progress or improvement had been made with some of our concerns”, and it formally wrote to NHS Tayside to urge it to meet national standards for maternity services. Concerns included “variations in oversight and governance observed in both the hospital inspection and maternity services, and a lack of oversight by senior managers within maternity services”. Other areas of improvement included “safe staffing, fire safety issues and the maintenance of the hospital environment”, according to HIS. Read full story Source: The Scotsman, 15 May 2025
  4. News Article
    Next week (Thursday 15 May) the Scottish Parliament will be invited to nominate Karen Titchener to His Majesty for appointment as Scotland’s inaugural Patient Safety Commissioner. The role of the Patient Safety Commissioner will be to advocate for systematic improvement in the safety of health care in Scotland and promote the importance of the views of patients and other members of the public in relation to the safety of health care. Karen Titchener is currently serving as Vice President of Hospital at Home Operation in the USA and brings over two decades of senior leadership experience within the NHS, having also previously worked at Guys and St Thomas NHS Trust. Mrs Titchener is expected to take up post on 1 September 2025 for a fixed term of eight years. Read the full article. Source: The Scottish Government, 9 May 2025 Related reading Consultation Analysis Report on the role of a Patient Safety Commissioner for Scotland (2 December 2021) Patient Safety Commissioner for Scotland: Consultation Response (Patient Safety Learning)
  5. Content Article
    Published by Healthcare Improvement Scotland in March, the new cervical screening standards include recommendations to ensure women receive accessible letters and information about screening and healthcare professionals are trained to support women to make informed choices. To support women to make informed decisions about cervical screening, information should be provided in a format and language that suits their needs. Support should be provided to enable informed decisions with opportunities for questions. Care should be compassionate, trauma informed, understanding and non-judgemental. Women should always be respected and supported in their choices and decisions. Further reading on the hub Top picks: Seven resources about improving access to cervical screening
  6. Content Article
    A wide ranging and comprehensive independent review of emergency departments within NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde has found a system under pressure, where unacceptable practices such as patients waiting on trolleys in corridors, have become normalised. The report published by Healthcare Improvement Scotland concludes that relationships need to be repaired between various groups of staff, supported by compassionate leadership. The poor relationships highlighted in the review are impeding the NHS board’s ability to address the problems – this was particularly prominent within the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital. The report finds that a culture of “disrespectful behaviours, poor teamwork and incivility” is having a negative impact on staff morale and wellbeing, and it is likely having a detrimental impact on patient care. The report makes 30 recommendations for NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, but the findings also have national implications with a further 11 recommendations for Scottish Government and national agencies. The review – chaired by experienced, independent experts Dr Pamela Johnston and Prof Hazel Borland – was carried out as a result of concerns raised by a group of emergency department clinicians at Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, who believed that patient care was being compromised and that their concerns were not being listened to. National recommendations Scottish Government Scottish Government should commission Healthcare Improvement Scotland to lead the development of a national approach to improving the quality and safety of urgent and unscheduled care in NHS Scotland, consistent with the Quality Management System, including the development of national standards in partnership with a range of agencies including the Royal Colleges. This will build on work already commenced by The Centre for Sustainable Delivery and include urgent work needed to work towards eliminating the unacceptable use of non-standard care areas given the risks to patients and the impact on staff. This will require significant national focus and support. Scottish Government should explore with Healthcare Improvement Scotland how best to gather patient views about experiences of accessing urgent and unscheduled care services and waiting in emergency departments to inform more detailed national recommendations on how to improve the patient experience and shape services for the future. Scottish Government should engage with relevant national agencies to commission a review of the national guidance for specific health and care demand, capacity escalation and business continuity, which recognises the need to ensure a credible, robust and practical whole system response. This is essential and complementary to the current Multi Agency Major Incident Guidance. Scottish Government should engage with relevant national agencies to commission a review of the professional advisory committee arrangements in NHS boards to ensure they have a transparent, independent and objective mechanism for the board to consider matters of safety and concern. There is an opportunity to refresh the previous national guidance and make these arrangements clearer and more open for all professions to understand. Public Health Scotland Reliable and comparable whole-system datasets are essential to support improvement in urgent and unscheduled care and optimise flow through the health and social care system. Public Health Scotland should be commissioned by Scottish Government to work with other national and local partners with the aim of progressing existing work and further developing datasets that are designed with, and available to NHS boards to support continuous improvement. The Centre for Sustainable Delivery The Centre for Sustainable Delivery should strengthen its collaboration with territorial and national NHS boards to engage in improvement activities aimed at: Reducing unwarranted variation in urgent and unscheduled care performance to enhance the quality and experience of care, as well as patient outcomes. Rethinking access to urgent and unscheduled care to ensure equity and that individuals are treated in the right place, the first time. • Ensuring appropriate representation, including clinical leaders, in the recently formed Strategic Delivery Groups to drive improvement, set standards, and deliver change. Participating in the acute hospital site visit process to ensure that change is driven by clinical teams and tailored to meet the needs of local communities. NHS Education for Scotland NHS Education for Scotland should strengthen and further develop structured development programmes to identify and support clinical and non-clinical leaders in NHS Scotland. These programmes will enable NHS boards to focus on developing whole system multidisciplinary working and relationships which foster innovation, improvement and inclusivity in decisions that explicitly benefit quality of care and patient safety NHS Education for Scotland should be supported by Scottish Government to explore the implications, and work towards the shift to whole time equivalent medical trainee recruitment in order to strengthen the learning experience, reduce gaps in service and build a more sustainable, effective medical workforce for the future. The review has highlighted the critical role of effective and supportive leadership by the NHS Board. It is recommended that the Scottish Government commission NHS Education for Scotland to evaluate the current national and local induction and support arrangements for NHS Non-executive Board Members. This evaluation should aim to identify and implement any necessary improvements to ensure that Non-executive Board Members can perform their roles as effectively as possible, and consistent with the requirements set out in the NHS Scotland Blueprint for Good Governance. Healthcare Improvement Scotland The review has identified that the tools for appropriate staffing levels with regard to emergency departments are not sufficiently robust. Healthcare Improvement Scotland’s Healthcare Staffing Programme should prioritise the development of new tools which reflect the current operating context and multi-disciplinary working to ensure safe and effective care. Healthcare Improvement Scotland should collaborate with the Independent National Whistleblowing Officer, and other relevant bodies, to develop clear and unambiguous guidance for staff in NHS boards on the national routes for staff to raise concerns under Whistleblowing and the Public Interest Disclosure Act. This will enable NHS boards to ensure that they have effective arrangements in place and improve staff awareness and understanding.
  7. Content Article
    After reporting on upsetting stories of patients trapped in corridor care, political correspondence for the Herald, Hannah Brown never thought she'd be one of them a couple of weeks later.  On a Monday night earlier this month, Hannah found herself lying on a trolley bed in a corridor somewhere in Glasgow’s Queen Elizabeth unable to sleep through the pain and discomfort.  What seemed to start off as an annoying sinus infection turned out to be quite a significant bout of pneumonia in both her lungs.  The experience allowed Hannah a personal insight into the current care and waits in Scotland’s NHS.  From her own care path to fellow patients’, what she found was deeply troubling. 
  8. Content Article
    In this podcast interview series, NHS whistleblower Peter Duffy and Patient Safety Learning’s Chief Executive Helen Hughes explore how the healthcare system responds when its staff raise concerns about patient safety. In each episode, Helen and Peter interview someone who has spoken up about patient safety issues in healthcare organisations, or who works to help staff raise concerns where they see unsafe care. In this episode, Peter and Helen speak to consultant endocrinologist Gordon Caldwell, who retired early from the NHS after speaking up about patient safety concerns in his hospital. Gordon shares his experience of raising concerns about unsafe staffing levels while working as a clinical lead and how this led to extreme stress and the decision to retire years before he had planned to. They discuss the importance of transparency, team work and clear record-keeping processes to ensure patients are kept safe and Gordon outlines how lack of accessible patient health records hinders decision-making and can lead to avoidable harm. They also look at how target-led approaches and financial incentives have led to cultural changes in healthcare organisations over the past few decades. Subscribe to our YouTube podcast to keep up to date with the latest episodes. View a transcript of this interview Read a blog from Peter and Helen about the interview series
  9. News Article
    Applications have re-opened for a £90,000-a-year patient safety role after two previous attempts to fill the role were unsuccessful. MSPs passed a law creating the post of Scotland's first ever Patient Safety Commissioner in September 2023. But despite a hefty salary, they have been unable to fill the post. The first round of interviews in April last year was unsuccessful with the cross party panel of MSPs turning down all of the candidates who were interviewed. The second round in November saw them offer the job to one candidate but they turned it down. The Commissioner’s role is to “advocate for the systematic improvement in the safety of health care and to promote the importance of the views of patients and other members of the public in relation to the safety of health care". It was created in the wake of a UK Government commissioned review of the hormonal pregnancy test Primodos, Sodium Valproate in pregnancy and transvaginal surgical mesh. Read full story (paywalled) Source: The Herald, 10 February 2025
  10. News Article
    The Scottish government is scrapping its plans to create a National Care Service. It is an embarrassing but perhaps predictable end to years of ambitious talk about finally coming up with a solution to the social care crisis. In a statement at Holyrood, the government tore up parts of the bill that would require major structural changes to the Scottish social care system. The downfall of the plan wasn't money or lack of ambition necessarily. And there was cross-party agreement on what needed to be done. The problem was a frustrating lack of consensus on how to get there. It is also the end of the process that has been costly too. More than £30m has already been spent on planning the policy cover the last three years. In 2021, Ms Sturgeon branded the National Care Service the "most ambitious reform since devolution". Now, the plan is in tatters, and it tells us a lot about how difficult social care reform is and what might lie in store for the Westminster government. Read full story Source: Sky News, 27 January 2025
  11. News Article
    Nearly one million people are set to be on a NHS waiting list in Scotland by next year, analysis has revealed, in projections that have been described as “terrifying”. The analysis produced by Edinburgh University shows NHS Scotland must treat at least 20 per cent more non-emergency hospital cases over the next three years to eliminate the backlog caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. And the research revealed the number of referrals waiting to be treated in Scotland topped 667,000 at the end of December 2023, covering an estimated 10 per cent of the population. Researchers warned that, without any increase in capacity, the waiting list will increase to nearly one million people by December 2026. Read full article. Source: The Scotsman, 10 January 2024
  12. Content Article
    The Scottish Health Equity Research Unit (SHERU) is a new policy research unit set up to accelerate efforts to improve health and reduce inequalities in Scotland.  The Health Foundation speak to Emma Congreve and Professor Kat Smith, co-leads of the unit, to find out more. 
  13. News Article
    "Difficult decisions" may need to be made about whether some services can continue to be provided by the NHS in Scotland, a spending watchdog has warned. A review by Audit Scotland said a clear plan was lacking - and that fundamental change in how NHS services are provided is "urgently needed" to cope with growing demand. The annual report into the health sector found that, despite increased spending and staffing in the NHS, Scotland is seeing fewer patients than before the Covid-19 pandemic. Health Secretary Neil Gray said the government did have a plan, which aimed to shift the focus towards preventative care. He told BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland: "The plan is to shift the balance of care from the secondary services where we're currently seeing extremely high demand in to more preventative primary care, so investing in GPs surgeries, pharmacies and optometrists to ensure people are treated earlier. "We recognise that for too many people, they're waiting for too long and there needs to be fundamental reform of the way our health service is delivered." The report highlighted that Scottish government commitments to reduce waiting lists and times have been missed and that delayed discharge figures are at their highest on record. It added that NHS initiatives to improve productivity and patient outcomes have yet to have an impact, and they lack clear progress reporting. Read full story Source: BBC News, 3 December 2024
  14. Content Article
    The Scottish Government needs a delivery plan that clearly explains to the public how it will reform the NHS and address the pressures on services. Despite increasing funding and staffing, the NHS in Scotland is still seeing fewer patients than before the Covid-19 pandemic. Auditors found that: commitments to reducing waiting lists and times have not been met the number of people remaining in hospital because their discharge has been delayed is the highest on record and NHS initiatives to improve productivity and patient outcomes have yet to have an impact and lack clear progress reporting.
  15. Content Article
    At Patient Safety Learning we often get asked by patients and families who have received poor healthcare what they need to do to make a complaint. Although we cannot get directly involved in individual cases, we have put together a simple guides on the step you can take if you need to make a complaint about NHS care in Scotland. We also have the following guides: How do I make a complaint about my NHS care in England: a simple guide for patients and families How do I make a complaint about my NHS care Northern Ireland: a simple guide for patients and families How do I make a complaint about my NHS care in Wales: a simple guide for patients and families How do I make a complaint about my private care: a simple guide for patients and families How do I make a complaint: Sources of help and advice If you are a healthcare professional looking at these pages, the NHS Complaint Standards, model complaint handling procedure and good complaint handling guides set out how organisations providing NHS services should approach complaint handling. They apply to all NHS organisations in England and independent healthcare providers who deliver NHS-funded care. In Scotland, your right to complaint is covered by the Charter of Patient Rights and Responsibilities. The Charter explains your rights to: Give feedback, make comments or raise concerns or complaints about the healthcare you receive. Be told the outcome of any investigation into your concerns or complaints. Have independent advice and support when providing feedback. Take your complaint to the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman (Ombudsman). Step 1: Frontline resolution Since April 2017, the NHS in Scotland aims to deal with more straightforward complaints within five days. This is known as frontline resolution. If you have a concern about health or social care issues, you can complain to any member of staff or ask to speak to the Feedback and Complaints Officer for the NHS organisation involved. If you are still at the place where you have received care, you can raise your concerns with the GP, nurse or other health professional you are dealing with. They may be able to resolve the complaint immediately and offer an apology. You can complain directly to the provider (GP practice, NHS dentist or hospital). If you do not wish to deal directly with the provider or if your complaint involves more than one NHS provider (such as a GP and a hospital or more than one hospital) the NHS Board can enable a co-ordinated investigation and response. Find your local NHS Board. Specific contact details for complaints can be found at NHS Inform. The provider will consider if the matter is a complaint and whether the issues are relatively straightforward and can be resolved with little or no investigation. If so, your case will be dealt with under frontline resolution. If your complaint is not resolved, see Step 2: Investigation. Step 2: Investigation This is the complaints handling process for cases which have not been resolved at the frontline stage or where the complaint is complex, serious or ‘high risk’. When will stage 2 be triggered? If frontline resolution has been attempted but you remain dissatisfied and request an investigation; this may happen immediately after the frontline stage decision or sometime later. If you refuse to take part in frontline resolution. If the issues raised are complex and require detailed investigation. If the complaint relates to serious, high-risk or high-profile issues. AvMA (Action against Medical Accidents) has a number of self-help guides that provide clear and straightforward explanations of the procedure and guide you through making a complaint, including a helpful template letter. The investigating officer may wish to contact you to discuss the scope of their investigation and to see whether the resolution you are seeking is achievable and realistic. They may ask you for additional information needed to investigate the complaint and should explain if they are going to seek such additional information. At this point they may offer you a meeting or telephone call to discuss the complaint. You do not have to agree to this. You should receive a full response to your complaint, by your preferred method of communication, within 20 working days. If you are not satisfied with the outcome but think that the provider could still put things right, you should respond setting out what you are unhappy with and how you think it could be resolved. If you do not think your concerns can be settled by the provider, you can contact the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman—see Step 3. Mediation is a service where independent mediators help the relevant parties to reach an agreement. You can request, or health boards may offer, to provide this service. Both parties must agree to take part before this can go ahead. You can get help finding mediation services in your area by asking the Feedback and Complaints Officer at your local health board. Step 3: Scottish Public Services Ombudsman If you are dissatisfied with the response you have received then you can contact the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman. Before you approach the Ombudsman, you must have completed the local resolution complaints process above. You will need to put your complaint in writing and include copies of all correspondence from the local resolution stage of your complaint. You should make your complaint to the Ombudsman within 12 months of the events or incident in question, or within 12 months of you becoming aware that there were grounds for complaint. Step 4: Judicial review In some cases, it may be appropriate to use the judicial review procedure, particularly if you urgently need to challenge the way in which the NHS has made a decision which affects you (for example, not to provide certain treatment). The Court of Session in Edinburgh can: Look at how the decision was made on a procedural basis. This is not an appeals process and cannot change or reverse the actual decision. Check that the NHS did not abuse its powers. Check that the NHS acted properly and lawfully. Judicial review is a remedy of last resort and is only very rarely applicable to NHS complaints. You will need specialised advice from a solicitor on whether there are grounds to apply for judicial review. The Law Society provides a list of lawyers who specialise in medical matters.
  16. News Article
    A mum says her life has been destroyed following a hernia repaired with a mesh implant – with pain so severe she considered ending her life. Roseanna Clarkin, 38, has suffered excruciating pain since medics used mesh products to repair the issue. Now she wants the use of mesh in hernia operations to be suspended, as it has for vaginal mesh following years of suffering by thousands of women. Revealing her own hell, Roseanna told how she was in so much pain she asked for ­guidance about how to legally end her own life. She said: "It sent me to a very dark place. I contacted Euthanasia UK. I asked how I could legally do this is Scotland." Roseanna tearfully admitted: "I said to my husband, 'I have had enough of fighting'." She added: "When I was going to the doctor's after my op, I wasn't believed. Read full story Source: Daily Record, 31 January 2022
  17. Event
    The Professional Standards Authority is hosting a seminar on how professional regulators and others can help to improve workplace cultures. The event will explore why a positive culture matters for patients and the public, and how to promote sexual safety in the workplace. You will hear from: Paul Whiteing, AVMA Simon Watson, Healthcare Improvement Scotland Professor Rosalind Searle, University of Glasgow Email [email protected] for more information or to register to attend.
  18. Content Article
    In this article in the Scotsman, former whistle blower, Iain Kennedy, writes about the culture of fear and blame in Scotland's NHS and how NHS staff must feel free to speak up about problems that affect patient safety.
  19. Content Article
    As reported recently, the Scottish Healthcare Workers Coalition called upon the Scottish Government to reinstate 'universal masking' in health and social care settings.  In this statement written in support of their campaign, an occupational safety and health practitioner, David Osborn, explains the legal requirements for risk assessments that the Government ought to have undertaken before reaching such a decision that exposes healthcare staff to the life-changing consequences associated with repeat Covid-19 infections.  He also explains the legal duty of the Government to consult with workers before implementing changes that may affect their health and safety. Neither duty (risk assessment nor prior consultation with workers) appears to have been well met, putting the Scottish Government and Health Boards in breach of UK-wide health and safety law.  The decision by the Scottish Government to withdraw the coronavirus guidance for extended use of facemasks across health and social care is clearly a matter that has significant implications for the safety of health and social care workers. It is a legal requirement under the Health and Safety at Work Act etc 1974 that employers (including Governments and their Health Boards) must do at least two things before implementing a change that may materially and substantially impact workers’ health and safety at work: They must conduct a suitable and sufficient risk assessment of the proposed actions; and They must consult with all employees or their elected representatives concerning the proposed change. 1. Risk assessment To be “suitable and sufficient” the risk assessment for the abandonment of universal masking should have considered several factors such as: The fact that variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus continue to evolve which are becoming more immune resistant and subject to vaccine escape. The opportunity for viruses to mutate in this way depends upon the sheer number of viruses in circulation within the population. The greater the number, then statistically the more likely it is that a variant could evolve with potential to partially or wholly defeat our current vaccines and greatly impair the nation’s recovery from the pandemic. It just takes for one single virus to mutate in a certain catastrophic way for this to happen – as will have been the case in Wuhan in 2019. Any responsible Government and Health Board should take all reasonably practicable steps to reduce the number of viruses circulating in the population, particularly in health and social care premises. The Scottish Government appears blind to this simple but important duty that it owes to the Scottish people and its healthcare workers in particular. Evidence is emerging that cases of SARS-CoV-2 reinfection and associated hospitalisations and deaths have increased in relative frequency as new Omicron lineages have emerged with enhanced transmissibility or immune escape characteristics. The evidence also suggests that the time interval between repeat infections is decreasing, particularly (and rather peculiarly) amongst individuals who have previously been infected with the Alpha (‘Kent’) variant which arose during the second wave (winter 2020-21). Many healthcare workers will have been infected during that period. The consequence is that these workers are (a) that these infections may recur more frequently and (b) are at greater risk from these repeat infections. It has long been established that each time a person is infected or reinfected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus they have a risk of developing Long Covid, which can have severe detrimental effect on their health and quality of life – sometimes causing debilitating, irreversible, long-term health conditions. The more times they become reinfected, the worse these conditions may be and the longer they may last. By law, the risk assessment must be recorded (on paper or electronically) and be made available to employees and their representatives immediately upon request. I therefore call upon the Scottish Government to confirm whether or not such a risk assessment was undertaken before the decision was taken to abandon universal masking. If one was done, then the Government and the Health Boards should publish it so that interested parties, such as the Coalition, can determine whether it has properly considered all relevant factors that have a direct bearing on the increased risk of healthcare worker infection and how they plan to mitigate that risk. If no such risk assessment was done, either by the Government centrally or by its Health Boards, then they have acted recklessly and unlawfully. 2. Consultation For clarity, the “consultation”, which is required by the Safety Representatives and Safety Committees Regulations 1977 and the Health and Safety (Consultation with Employees) Regulations 1996, has a very clear meaning. It means: a) providing employees, or their safety representatives, with all relevant information relating to any proposed change in health and safety arrangements (including giving them sight of any risk assessments) before that change is implemented; b) allowing the employees and their representatives sufficient time to discuss amongst themselves and seek any further advice they may need to inform an opinion about the change; c) the employer must then take account any the feedback that it receives. These are serious matters. The UK Government and the devolved administrations, through inept planning for pandemics and the issue of seriously flawed guidance, failed to provide health and social care workers with the necessary PPE to prevent them inhaling airborne virus whilst they cared for highly infectious patients. It is quite understandable that our brave healthcare workers are now so aggrieved by the Government’s decision. These are the same people for whom we, the public, stood and clapped so proudly at our doorsteps during those dark days. The chaotic state of the UK’s planning and preparedness for pandemics has been laid bare at the UK Covid-19 Public Inquiry. During future sessions, the Inquiry will receive evidence concerning the deception which was wrought upon healthcare workers that the flimsy paper masks they were given would keep them safe from the disease when health and safety law requires proper tested and certified respirators to be used (such as FFP3 and equivalent) when workers are exposed to dangerous microbiological hazards in their workplace. Current World Health Organization guidance still advocates that universal masking policies in health and social care premises do still have their place in Governments’ armoury of defence measures to keep healthcare workers safe. Given all that they have already been through, combined with the ongoing suffering that many of them are experiencing from the disease they have contracted whilst caring for us, surely it is now time for the Scottish Government to pay greater consideration and respect for their health and safety. Some commentators may view the abandonment of universal masking as the Government playing “Russian Roulette” with their health by "letting the virus rip" – as sadly it is likely to do as the autumn and winter seasons approach.
  20. Content Article
    In this report, Professor Brian Edwards summarises contributions given to the UK Covid-19 Inquiry by various politicians and senior civil servants, relating to how prepared the UK and Scottish Governments were for the Covid-19 pandemic. It contains reflections on the contributions of: Nicola Sturgeon (First Minister of Scotland during the pandemic) Matt Hancock (Secretary of State for Health and Social Care during the pandemic) Jenny Harries (Chief Executive of the UK Health Security Agency) Emma Reed (civil servant, DHSC)
  21. Content Article
    The General Medical Council opened its first office in Scotland in 2003. Here Nicola Cotter, Head of GMC Scotland, looks back at the 20 years since, and just a few of her team’s achievements.
  22. Content Article
    A new report published by Carers Scotland shows the devasting impact the health and social care crisis is having on the health of Scotland’s 800,000 unpaid carers.  Over a quarter of carers (28%) said their mental health is bad or very bad, rising to 37% for carers on Carer’s Allowance. A third (36%) of carers said that they had thoughts related to self-harm or suicide. Over half (54%) of carers said that their physical health had suffered because of their caring role, with one in five (20%) suffering a physical injury from caring. The results of a survey of over 1,700 Scottish unpaid carers shows the ongoing struggle that they are facing to access the services and support they need to care and manage their health and wellbeing. Despite their huge contribution to the Scottish economy, to our communities and to the lives of the people they care for, carers are facing deteriorating physical and mental health, loneliness and isolation with too many driven to deep mental despair as they are denied the support they need to maintain a healthy life. Only a third (38%) of carers are receiving support from formal social care services and over a third (35%) have not had any break from caring in the last year. There is lack of involvement of carers on hospital discharge with 60% not engaged by health services, despite being expected to provide care to someone at home. Only 18% were provided with sufficient support on discharge to protect their health or the health of the person they care for. Caring, particularly with such insufficient support, is damaging carers mental health. Carers shared in detail the impact that caring had on their mental health, with the majority (88%) having difficulty sleeping, continuous low mood (85%) and feelings of hopelessness (82%) including regularly feeling tearful (71%). This has led a shocking level of carers saying that they have thoughts of self-harm or suicide. And, concerningly, this lack of support from both health and social care services leaves little time for carers to look after their own health, with four in 10 (41%) saying that they have had to put off receiving healthcare treatment because of their caring role.
  23. Content Article
    This is part of our series of Patient Safety Spotlight interviews, where we talk to people working for patient safety about their role and what motivates them. Gordon talks to us about how bureaucracy in the health service can compromise patient safety, the vital importance of agreed quality standards and what hillwalking has taught him about healthcare safety.
  24. Content Article
    The protests outside the Scottish Parliament took an alarming turn recently with people wearing hospital gowns spattered with blood. The demonstrators were former patients of neurosurgeon Sam Eljamel, many allegedly harmed by him and still suffering and searching for answers years later. A public inquiry has been announced by the First Minister. As the Patient Safety Commissioner for Scotland Bill makes its way into law, Alan Clamp, chief executive officer of the Professional Standards Authority for Health and Social Care, asks what this means for Scotland and the safety of its patients? See also: Working together to achieve safer care for all: a blog by Alan Clamp
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