Tag Archives: Healthcare

News

Record High Wait Times at Scotland’s Largest Children’s Hospital

By  Cameron Noble

 

Following the record attendance of 306 children at Glasgow’s Royal Hospital for Children in one day, parents are encouraged to avoid A&E wherever possible.

71.5% of those who arrived at the emergency department of the Royal Hospital for Children were seen and admitted, transferred or discharged within four hours.

Resulting from a dramatic decrease in Scotland’s emergency departments’ waiting time performance, nearly 500 children waited longer than four hours, and 17 waited more than eight hours in the week ending November 20th.

Attached to the Royal Hospital for Children, Queen Elizabeth University Hospital had managed to deal with 35.1% of attendees within a four-hour period – the worst figures for any individual hospital recorded, according to Public Health Scotland.

Over the entire of Scotland, wait time performance for the week ending November 20th dropped to 63.1% – an alarming figure, considering the Scottish Government’s target aims to deal with 95% of attendees within four hours.

Humza Yousaf, Scotland’s Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care, commented on the issue: “The figures for Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow are especially horrendous – the worst ever for any individual hospital with just 35.1% of patients seen within four hours.

“This is completely unacceptable and incredibly alarming for the safety of patients and staff at the hospital.”

Figures suggest the NHS will be undertaking the heaviest challenge to date over the winter period to find a way to improve their wait time performance and strive for 95% efficiency. Yousaf identified apparent factors which have contributed to the decreasing wait time performance and explained the £600m plan which is to be set to tackle the issue.

“Covid continues to impact the performance of services and pandemic backlogs, Brexit-driven staff shortages, and inflation costs have all contributed to make this winter the most challenging the NHS has ever faced.

“Delayed discharge continues to be the single biggest factor driving up A&E waits and we are working hard to ensure people are leaving hospital without delay, freeing up vital beds for those who need them most.

“A key focus of our winter plan is on social care and actions to encourage authorities to help ease delays.

“Our £600m winter plan will see us recruit 1,000 new NHS staff and our £50m urgent and unscheduled care collaborative looks to drive down A&E waits through scheduled urgent appointments, hospital at home and directing people to the most appropriate care.”

Opinion

Can Scotland mimic Portugal’s approach to the drug crisis?

By Gregor Boyd

For many years now. Scotland’s drug crisis has been widely reported on. According to the National  Record of Statistics in Scotland. The number of deaths has continued to rise. 2021 saw a slight decrease in the number of drugs with 9 less than the year before.

Dundee has been dubbed the drug capital of Europe. With drugs being readily available and even purchasable online. It’s never been easier to find a supply. Despite attempts by police to clamp down on it. The people of Scotland continue to suffer and the impact this causes on local health services that are already struggling. Attempts by campaigners to change the laws surrounding drugs have been met with resistance.

Treating it as a health problem and not a criminal issue is seen by many as the way forward, emulating the approach taken by Portugal. This revolutionary method was adopted as a policy in 2001.  The policy decriminalised all personal possession, consumption and acquisition of drugs. 

This approach removed the criminal nature associated with being caught using drugs. This health-based policy saw benefits with decreases in drug use, drug death and more people seeking treatment, leading to other countries wanting to adopt similar methods due to the popularity of the policy.

Scotland’s attempts to mitigate this crisis have seen campaigns supporting the idea of injecting clinics where users can safely dispose of needles. People in shops are also being trained on reversing opiate overdose with Naloxone kits. Despite the steps put forward by the Scottish govt on proposed Injecting clinics, this has been knocked back by the UK government. A working solution in countries such as Denmark and Canada is to keep needles off of streets, prevent unnecessary drug deaths and mitigate some of the dangers users may face when trying to inject.

The problems facing Scotland’s drug population were also exacerbated due to the Covid-19 pandemic as places took steps to mitigate the spread of the virus. The isolation people had to undertake made things harder for many addicts who might have depended on social interactions or in-person meetings.

The Minister for Drug Policy Angela Constance has been in touch with the newly appointed Conservative MP Jeremy Quin, Minister of State for Crime, Policing and Fire in an attempt to collectively work to address and tackle drug use across the United Kingdom.  The UK government’s hardline approach to the drug policy published earlier this year appears to be a 3 tier structure starting with Fixed Penalty notices moving upwards in severity to mandatory drug testing and awareness courses and finally, formal court proceedings resulting in potential confiscation of Passport/Driving Licence.