NHSSCOTLAND STAFF SURVEY 2013 National Report

4. Response Rate

All NHSScotland employees (n=156,625)^[8] were invited to take part in the 2013 Staff Survey and 44,389 returned a completed questionnaire (either online or by post). This represents a 28% response rate, which is slightly higher than the response rate for the 2010 NHSScotland Staff Survey (26%).

Response rates for each of the 22 NHS Boards in Scotland are shown in Figure 1. These are grouped into three categories: Island Boards (n=3), Mainland Boards (n=11) and National Bodies/Special Boards (n=8). It is important to bear in mind the different categories of Board, as well as differences within these categories, when considering the findings. Across the 22 Boards in Scotland, response rates ranged from 19% and 20% in NHS Tayside and NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde to 80% in NHS Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS) and 94% in NHS Health Scotland. The majority of staff working in these latter Boards are office-based administrative and clerical staff with direct access to a computer. The lowest response rates tended to be in the larger Mainland Boards.

Overall, 88% of responses were submitted electronically and 12% on paper. Across the 22 NHS Boards this ranged from 0% to 47% paper submission. As noted above, the Sample Profile for the 2013 survey is described in Appendix A: Figure 5a their employment profile and Figure 5b their socio-demographic profile.

Figure 1: Percentage of staff who completed the NHSScotland Staff Survey 2013, by NHS Board (grouped by Board type).^1,2

1 Percentage response calculated according to number of NHSScotland staff in post (head count) on 30th June 2013. (Source: NHS Scotland Workforce: data as at 30 June 2013⁸)

2 A member of staff may be employed by more than one NHS Board; each member of staff is counted only once in the NHSScotland head count total.