Questions and answers

Question reference: S6W-14674

Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 February 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 6 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has established referral guidelines for common symptoms of heart disease to support timely access to diagnostics.

Question reference: S6W-14683

Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 February 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 6 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to support the development of psychological liaison roles to support people with long-term conditions, including heart disease.

Question reference: S6W-14686

Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 February 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 6 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government when it last carried out modelling of the cardiac physiology workforce, and what the outcome was.

The National Integrated Workforce Strategy published in 2019 committed to increase the Cardiac Physiologist workforce, thereby increasing capacity to carry out diagnostic testing, by supporting an additional 30 training places on the 4 year BSc course in Clinical Physiology.

Over the next 3-5 years we will also focus on increasing the workforce by promoting recruitment into Scientist Training Programmes and Practitioner BSC Programmes” We have supported 17 new practitioners through the 4 year BSc Course and 13 new Clinical Scientists.

More recently in 2022, the Clinical Physiology Executive Board has scoped and collected data on all physiology science services. The information that has been garnered from this exercise will feed into the wider strategic piece of work in relation to Healthcare Science education and training.

Question reference: S6W-14685

Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 February 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 6 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to ensure that understanding the need for access to (a) timely diagnostic tests, (b) specialist services and (c) cardiac rehabilitation and palliative care for people with heart disease is embedded in wider work on data and quality improvement to enable unwarranted variation to be addressed.

In April 2021, Scottish Government commissioned Public Health Scotland to develop and deliver the Scottish Cardiac Audit Programme. Over 100 clinicians and people with lived experience have been involved in the development of draft indicators for this programme. This includes health care professionals with an interest in specialist services, cardiac rehabilitation and palliative care.

Draft indicators were shared for further feedback in autumn 2022. PHS continue to work to develop the audit programme based on this feedback.

Question reference: S6W-14667

Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 February 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 6 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what action it has taken to implement a person-centred and co-designed community-based awareness, prevention and detection programme for high blood pressure and high cholesterol.

Question reference: S6W-14688

Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 February 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 6 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government, to support nationally agreed pathways of care, what action it is taking to produce a nationally-agreed competency framework for health care professionals who provide care for people with heart disease.

Under the Heart Disease Task Force oversight, a Short Life Working Group has been supporting the development of a layer of cardiac specific competencies intended to complement the wider Transforming Nursing Roles competencies for Clinical Nurse Specialists.

The Scottish Government is currently working with NHS Education for Scotland to identify a workplan for the next phase of the Transforming Roles Programme. This involves agreeing priority actions and implementing outstanding recommendations from the ‘Transforming Nursing, Midwifery and Health Professions’ Roles: Review of Clinical Nurse Specialist and Nurse Practitioner Roles within Scotland’ publication.

At a time of significant system pressure, this priority setting is to be undertaken as part of wider considerations in collaboration with the Scottish Executive Nurse Directors Group in Spring 2023.

In addition, the Allied Health Professional Education and Workforce Policy Review that considered the actions necessary to deliver a national education and workforce plan for AHPs has now been completed. The recommendations will be published early 2023 and an implementation plan will be developed thereafter.

Question reference: S6W-14666

Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 February 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 6 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what action it has taken to establish a platform for healthcare professionals and researchers to access current heart disease-related data and intelligence.

Question reference: S6W-14675

Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 February 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 6 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what innovative models of care for cardiac diagnostics it has piloted since 2021.

Question reference: S6W-14682

Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 February 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 6 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government, as part of the implementation of the mental health transition and recovery plan, what action it is taking to promote the needs of people who have been bereaved by sudden cardiac death.

Question reference: S6W-14689

Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 February 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 6 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to carry out a gap analysis of the cardiology and cardiac surgery workforce that has been informed by the nationally-agreed pathways and the developed competency framework.

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