Report highlights “fundamental weaknesses” in Scottish NHS

Staff seem to have been employed in the Scottish NHS in jobs of no productive value during years of financial growth, a report from the Scottish Parliament’s health committee says.

Between 2002 and 2009 the number of medical staff in Scottish hospitals doubled, and there was a 76% increase in nursing staff. The report says, however, that hospital workload increased by considerably less than this.

This “raises issues about the way the NHS system has been overseen and the way NHS Boards are made accountable for the use of limited funds,” it …