Quarter of Scots believe terminally ill loved ones did not get the right care

One in four Scots believe a relative or close friend with a terminal illness did not get the care they need, a survey has found.

The study for charity Marie Curie also reported nearly a third of Scots (29 per cent) were not confident they would receive the necessary care if they were diagnosed with a terminal illness.

The top reasons for this lack of confidence were rising rates of people having more than one terminal condition (61 per cent) and a lack of health service funding (60 per cent).

The third most common reason was the belief there were higher numbers of terminally ill people, meaning the health services found it harder to cope (58 per cent).

Those who felt there was less availability of high quality care at home (55 per cent) was the fourth highest reason.

A total of 305 respondents to the Yougov survey of 1,028 Scottish adults carried out between 7-9 November said they had experience of either themselves, a relative or close friend with a terminal illness in the past three years.

Of this group, 25 per cent said they did not believe the care needed was given.

However, more than half (54 per cent) of all those surveyed believed they would get better quality care in Scotland than in England.

Susan Lowes, Marie Curie policy and public affairs manager for Scotland, said: “We continue to hear that terminally ill people don’t get the care they need or it comes too late.”