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The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that all people living in Scotland with long-term conditions including chronic kidney disease, are able to access the best possible care and support, and benefit from healthcare services that are safe, effective and put people at the centre of their care.

Financial support for travel to hospital appointments is available to patients and authorised escorts, according to eligibility criteria and medical requirements. Where travel is necessary, Boards are expected to support patients to identify and access support available, taking account individual circumstances and ensuring patient care is at the centre of all decisions made.

In January 2024 we implemented a national policy for the reimbursement of electricity costs for home dialysis patients to address inconsistencies across Health Boards where some fully reimburse electricity costs, and others provide partial reimbursement or none at all. Boards are expected to proactively identify eligible patients and make reimbursement. A review of implementation is currently underway and a further update will be provided in Autumn 2024.

Financial support for travel to hospital appointments is available to patients and authorised escorts, according to eligibility criteria and medical requirements. The Scottish Government provides the overall guidance to NHS Boards on reimbursement of patient travel costs and Boards are responsible for setting and applying local policy.

Where travel is necessary, Boards are expected to support patients to identify and access support available, taking account individual circumstances and ensuring patient care is at the centre of all decisions made.

Where a patient is eligible for assistance with travel costs, claims should normally be ratified and reimbursed within 1 to 2 weeks, allowing time for the claim and supporting documentation to be reviewed. Where assistance is required with upfront costs, Health Boards can make bookings on behalf of eligible patients and this should be discussed with the relevant Health Board as part of the overall treatment arrangements.

In January 2024 we implemented a national policy for the reimbursement of electricity costs for home dialysis patients to address inconsistencies across Health Boards where some fully reimburse electricity costs, and others provide partial reimbursement or none at all. Boards are expected to proactively identify eligible patients and ensure electricity costs for eligible patients are reimbursed promptly. A review of implementation is currently underway and a further update will be provided in Autumn 2024.

The Scottish Government does not hold, nor collect, data on children and young people who have been recorded as going missing after being placed in Adult Mental Health Services.

The Scottish Government does not hold the data requested which is a matter for health boards locally.

Recruitment and training of registered mental health professionals is a matter for employers such as NHS boards and Local Authorities. These bodies make informed decisions about recruiting counsellors and psychotherapists or training new mental health practitioners, according to the needs of local service providers and working with relevant professional bodies. The Scottish Government expects employers to apply standards and frameworks which are appropriate to the specialism being recruited for.

In September 2023, we published Mental Health Core Standards, initially applying to adult secondary mental health services. These outline national expectations to boards regarding staffing levels and appropriate skills.

The Scottish Government does not hold information specifically on the number of e-bike thefts as the data we receive from Police Scotland is a general count of the number of crimes and offences recorded by the police, split by local authority.

Depending on the circumstances of any given case, such as how an e-bike was stolen or it’s spec, there are a number of different crime classifications that might be used by the police (for example Theft of a Pedal Cycle, Theft of a Motor Vehicle, Robbery etc.). As such, it is not possible to identify within the Recorded Crime statistics how many of the cases involve an e-bike being stolen.

This information is not held by the Scottish Government. All NHS Board expenditure is recorded via the Scottish Financial Returns, which provides operating costs relating to the running of all services provided to patients across NHS Scotland, however, it does not show specific costs for conditions such as thrombosis.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-28882 on 26 August 2024. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers.

Local recruitment is the responsibility of the Health Board with the Scottish Government providing support for workforce planning. Since December 2023, Scottish Government officials have met nursing leadership in all territorial Boards and all universities offering the post graduate health visiting course. These discussions included exploring recruitment and retention challenges and successes. Innovative recruitment and retention practices, identified as part of those discussions, will be shared across all Health Board partners.

Attraction and retention of people into nursing and midwifery more generally is a key part of the remit of the Nursing and Midwifery Taskforce. The Taskforce, chaired by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care, will recommend a workplan of actions to support workforce sustainability, workplace culture, practice, flexibility, recruitment and retention, alongside the diversification of training pathways.

Jenni Minto: The Scottish Government does hold the information on how much each NHS board spends on raising awareness of thrombosis.

Although the Scottish Government has not funded a national awareness raising campaign for thrombosis in recent years, in December 2023, Scottish Government social media health channels ran a series of online awareness-raising messages on the risks and symptoms of DVT.

In addition, the guidance available to the general public on NHS Inform on deep vein thrombosis is reviewed regularly to ensure it is up to date, with the most recent update taking place in July 2024.

To support clinicians, the Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN) are responsible for publishing new rapid guidelines, with SIGN 122 and SIGN 163(specifically in relation to the prevention and management of venous thromboembolism (VTE) and VTE in patients with COVID-19 respectively) both being available.

SIGN supports the implementation of these guidelines by; raising awareness; networking with national projects and clinical networks; and developing implementation support tools and resources alongside specific guidelines.

The Scottish Government have no current plans run a national awareness campaign for thrombosis, however we are engaging with stakeholders and intend to mark World Thrombosis Day in October via social media channels.