Hospital payment models in Scotland: FOI release

Information requested

Information regarding hospital payment models in Scotland.

Response

I enclose a copy of some of the information you requested.

The NHS Recovery, Health & Social Care portfolio is responsible for supporting our health and social care services. Detail on the 2024-25 Budget can be found here. In 2024-25, over £13.2 billion is allocated to frontline NHS Boards to take forward the improvement of health in their communities and to assess and deliver the most effective care for the people they serve.

NHS Board funding allocations are determined via review of the prior year baseline allocations and applying a number of adjustments to arrive at an updated value for each individual NHS Board. These adjustments include; inflationary uplifts, incorporating prior years recurring allocation funding, and recent pay uplifts.

NHS Board funding is then guided through use of the National Resource Allocation Committee (NRAC) formula. The NRAC formula is an objective measure of the need for health care services across Scotland. It considers the population share of each NHS Board adjusted for the age/sex composition of the population, the relative health needs due to morbidity and life circumstances, and the excess cost of delivering healthcare to rural and remote areas. The formula is not designed to establish the budgets of individual NHS Boards but rather provides a basis for distribution of the national health budget in a way that takes into account local need. The approach taken by the Scottish Government has been to move NHS Boards towards parity gradually over a number of years. Currently, NHS Boards sit no further than -0.6% away from parity. Adjustments are made to their budget to ensure this threshold is achieved.

NHS Boards are responsible for deciding the distribution of funding that they receive from the Scottish Government across the services they manage, including the funding of hospitals.

As a result of this the Scottish Government does not hold the information you seek on operation and incentives in hospitals as this would be specific to each Board. You may wish to speak to individual Boards in relation to how they manage spend on the topics that you have requested.

Although this is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have some of the information that you have requested, approaching Boards directly should be able to answer your queries.

I trust you will find this information helpful.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.