Gray urged to take ‘decisive action’ on A&E figures

Health Secretary Neil Gray is being urged to take decisive action to deal with the waiting times crisis in Scotland’s accident and emergency departments – despite the latest weekly figures showing some improvement.

In the week ending Sunday March 3, two-thirds (65.3 per cent) of the 26,055 people who attended A&E were seen and either admitted, transferred or discharged within the fourhour target.

That is up from the 64 per cent achieved the previous week, but still well below the Scottish Government's target of 95 per cent.

The latest figures from Public Health Scotland show 9,045 patients were in the emergency department for longer than four hours.

This includes 3,048 who were there for eight hours or more, and 1,206 who spent at least half a day in A&E.

According to the data, only one regional health board met the 95 per cent target in the week ending March 3 – NHS Western Isles dealt with 97.7 percent of patients inside four hours.

There were three hospitals where less than half of A&E patients were admitted, transferred or discharged within the target time – Forth Valley Royal Hospital in Larbert dealt with 43.3 per cent of patients in this time, while the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh and Aberdeen Royal Infirmary achieved 45.5 per cent and 49.8 per cent respectively.

The conservatives said the figures show Mr Gray needs to take “decisive action to tackle this waiting time crisis directly”.

Tory health spokesman dr Sandesh Gulhane said: “It is appalling that it’s now the norm for more than a third of Scots to wait over four hours to be seen in our A&E departments.

”These unacceptable delays are a direct result of the SNP’S dire workforce planning and Humza Yousaf 's failed Covid recovery plan.”