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Treatment for anaphylaxis may take place in primary care, in accident and emergency departments and in hospitals. Statistics provided by ISD shows the number of patients aged (a) under 16 years and (b) 16 years and over, who were discharged from hospital following treatment for anaphylaxis.

Table 1: Patients treated in hospital for a diagnosis of anaphylaxis in NHS Scotland; 2007 to 2018

We expect NHS Boards to adhere to current guidelines on the treatment of anaphylaxis from authorative professional sources such as the Resuscitation Council UK and National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).

Listed below are the six public inquiries constituted under the Inquiries Act 2005 since 2007. There have been a variety of other reviews and non-statutory inquiries for which costs are not held centrally.

The Scottish Government recognises the need to ensure that health and social care professionals have the knowledge, skills and confidence to provide high quality palliative and end of life care, relevant to their role.

In April 2018, we published a new palliative and end of life care Educational Framework that can be used in all health and social care settings to support staff who care for those with palliative and end of life care needs in their professional development. This can be found at: https://www.nes.scot.nhs.uk/newsroom/features-and-articles/palliative-and-end-of-life-care-enriching-and-improving-experience.aspx .

The Scottish Government is clear about the priority we place on ensuring people can access high quality palliative and end of life care.

Our Strategic Framework for Action on Palliative and End of Life Care sets out our ambition that we want those who would benefit from palliative and end of life care to have access to it by 2021. This ambition was re-affirmed in our Health and Social Care Delivery Plan which was published in December 2016.

Good care at end of life requires collaborative, multi-disciplinary support, which is why Integration Authorities have been given statutory responsibility for meeting this need. Integration Authorities regularly report on their progress using the 23 indicators (https://www2.gov.scot/Topics/Health/Policy/Adult-Health-SocialCare-Integration/Outcomes/Indicators/Indicators ) that support the statutory outcomes set out in the Public Bodies (Joint Working) (Scotland) Act 2014.

The indicator currently used nationally to gauge progress on improving the availability of palliative and end of life care is the percentage of last six months of life spent in the community. Since the publication of the Health and Social Care Delivery Plan in 2015-16, the percentage of time spent at home or in a community setting continues to increase from 86.7% to 88.1%. This is an encouraging shift as it equates to, on average an extra five days within the last six months of life being supported at home or in a community setting. However, we recognise that this indicator is not sufficient on its own. We are working with partners in local systems and health and social care professionals to improve our understanding of the quantity and quality of palliative care across Scotland.

Providing high quality, person centred care for people towards the end of life is an important priority for the Scottish Government.

We want people to get the care and support that is right for them and enable them to stay in their local community for as long as possible. Our ambition to ensure people get the care that is right for them in a community setting is reflected in our budget this year, which provides investment of more than £700 million to support social care services and speed up the pace of integration. We are on track to deliver our commitment that more than 50% of frontline NHS spending will be shifted to community health services by the end of this Parliament.

The Scottish Government recognises the need to ensure that health professionals have the knowledge, skills and confidence to provide high quality palliative and end of life care, relevant to their role.

In April 2018, we published a new palliative and end of life care Educational Framework that can be used in all health and social care settings to support staff who care for those with palliative and end of life care needs in their professional development. This can be found at: https://www.nes.scot.nhs.uk/newsroom/features-and-articles/palliative-and-end-of-life-care-enriching-and-improving-experience.aspx .

The Scottish Government continues to provide funding to NHS Education for Scotland (NES) and the Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) to support training associated with the Framework across relevant health and social care settings.

Our Programme for Government 2019-2020 commits to establishing a Women’s Health Plan to reduce inequalities in health outcomes that affect women, including reducing inequalities relating to cardiac disease. In order to inform and develop the Plan, key stakeholders have been invited to join a Women’s Health Group which will be chaired by the Chief Medical Officer. The first meeting is due to take place in February 2020.

We continue to implement our heart disease improvement plan, which sets out the priorities and actions that we will take to deliver improved prevention, treatment and care for all patients.

Details of NHS expenditure on general practice and dental services are made available each year in the annual NHS publication “Scottish Health Service Costs”, also known as the Cost Book. The latest available Cost Book is for 2018-19 and the report can be accessed at the following location: https://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Finance/Publications/ .