People are to be offered urgent appointments with alternative healthcare professionals as the latest initiative to reduce the number of people going to Scotland’s emergency departments.

The Scottish government is today revealing that NHS boards will share £50 million in the current financial year to be part of an Urgent and Unscheduled Care Collaborative.

The government says the collaborative will also examine how the process of discharging people from hospital can be simplified to ensure patients don't face unnecessary delays moving to a more appropriate setting when there is no medical reason for them to remain in hospital.

It's the latest announcement from the ongoing Review of Urgent Care, which has so far seen £43 million invested since March 2020 in a mix of initiatives – including a national ‘right care, right place’ marketing campaign – with the overall aim of dissuading people from going to A&E unless they have a serious injury or illness.

Evaluations of the programme have raised concerns that people were not using NHS24 to be signposted to the right care because calls were taking too long to be answered.

Last year an independent assessment showed relatively few patients had been diverted away from emergency departments.

In March this year, ministers announced that they had commissioned a further independent evaluation of the implementation of the redesign programme.

Announcing the funding for the 2022-2023 programme, Health Secretary, Humza Yousaf said:

“It is absolutely crucial we ensure people are receiving the right care at the right time and in the right place. That’s why I’m pleased to confirm today’s £50 million investment to help achieve our national urgent and unscheduled care priorities. 

“Our twin approach of investment and reform in urgent and unscheduled care will help boards see people who need urgent attention more quickly. For many, A&E may not be the best place for their healthcare needs and our £50 million improvement programme will offer patients alternative routes to urgent care.

“Last year 4,500 patients received care from a Hospital at Home service – without this these patients would have experienced an acute hospital stay, we are determined to build on this success.”

The need to reduce the time people are delayed from being discharged from hospital was highlighted in a report this week by the Royal College of Emergency Medicine which said over 4,000 beds have been lost in the last 12 years. The reportcalled for immediate steps to be taken to provide and staff 545 additional beds by next winter to achieve any sort of improvement to hospital capacity.  

 

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