22 August 2003
Information systems are so poor in some Scottish health trusts that up to 6 million more people are using outpatient services than are documented each year, Audit Scotland warned this week.
The watchdog carried out a week-long census of outpatient activity in acute and primary care trusts and estimates that the true number of patients using this service tops 10 million a year, rather than the 4.7 million recorded in national returns.
The census found that only 52% of outpatient clinics were run by doctors, accounting for 11% or £300m of NHS funding in Scotland.
Many trusts failed to provide basic information on the efficiency of these clinics and even less is known about the remaining 48% run by other health-care professionals.
'New ways of working often mean that patients no longer need to be admitted to hospital for certain conditions and treatments,' said deputy auditor general Caroline Gardner. 'Information systems are out of date and need to be overhauled to support these new ways of working.'
The census also found that most outpatients require return appointments - 69% in the acute sector and 86% in primary care.
One in seven patients did not attend their appointments while one in every 100 clinics was cancelled.
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