Scottish Conservative MSP Edward Mountain is condemning poor planning and resources as Highlanders face ‘the longest ambulance waiting times in Scotland’
A local MSP is voicing concern over data which he says shows Highlanders face the longest wait for ambulances in Scotland.
Edward Mountain, a Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party member for the Highlands and Islands, branded the figures “unacceptable” and called them a reflection of poor planning and resources.
However, a spokesman for the ambulance service said the figures could partly be blamed on “Highland’s sizable geography”.
Contained within the Scottish Ambulance Service’s (SAS’s) unscheduled care operational statistics, the figures showed ambulances serving the NHS Highland area attended 25 ‘code red patients’ in the week commencing August 26.
The authority’s median ambulance response time to these emergency calls was 11 minutes and three seconds, which is over three minutes higher than the NHS’s target ‘code red’ response time of eight minutes.
The 90th percentile response time was 23 minutes 54 seconds, meaning that 10 per cent of critically unwell callers were waiting for over three times the NHS’s target.
Mr Mountain said the figures represented the highest median response time in any health authority in Scotland, “and by far the highest 90th percentile response time, too”.
And he warned that Highland was “once again falling far behind both NHS targets and the national average".
Mr Mountain, who has previously held a summit meeting to discuss health in the Highlands and campaigned for a new Highland hospital, said: “I was very disappointed when confronted with the appalling figures released this morning, which reveal that the Highlands are once again far behind both the national average and the NHS target for ambulance wait times.
“I understand that the rural geography of the Highlands can make shorter response times difficult in some cases, but the extremity of these figures cannot be understated.
“People’s lives are put in greater danger when these wait times extend, without limit or action.
“It is not acceptable that Highlanders are left frightened and in pain for far longer than those residing in other areas of Scotland.
“The figures reaffirm what I have been saying for a long time – that healthcare infrastructure in the Highlands is not adequately prioritised.”
The full figures can be found in this Scottish Ambulance Service (SAS) document.
A spokesman for the SAS responded to Mr Mountain’s comments saying: “No-one wants a patient to wait longer than they have to and we focus our efforts to attend patients who are critically unwell as quickly as possible.
“We apologise to anyone who has waited longer than expected. The time taken to respond to a call can vary due to a range of issues including the type of call, demand on the system and Highland’s sizable geography.
“In the most recent published data from the week commencing August 19 the median response time for our most critically unwell patients in the Highlands was 5 minutes and 20 seconds.
“We remain committed to providing the very best patient care to our patients and have a range of services that can be deployed in the area, depending on the nature of the incident, including our air ambulance service.
“We also use our Integrated Clinical Hub Team to triage patients remotely who are focused on supporting the patient through enhanced assessment as this can help them receive care through an alternative route which frees up Ambulance capacity and reduces demand at the A&E.”
