Statistics
Latest Publication Data
Data presented in this publication includes:
- the number of complaints received;
- the time taken to deal with complaints;
- issues raised in complaints;
- staff groups who were the subject of complaints; and,
- the outcome of complaints.
The latest report (Complaints Statistics 2010/11) is available here.
A summary of the key points from this publication is available here.
Definitions of the terms used in the report are available on the Data Sources and Definitions page.
About these Statistics
These data are presented for NHS territorial Health Boards (e.g. NHS Fife) and Special Boards (e.g. Scottish Ambulance Service).Family Health Services data within this report is restricted to the volume of complaints received by primary care service providers and is presented on the basis of NHS territorial Health Boards.
Territorial Health Boards submit their complaints data to ISD after the end of each quarter of the financial year. The data covers complaints received by Hospital & Community Services and includes all formal written complaints. These data are validated by ISD and checked with the boards after submission. The statistics relating to GP and dental services are collated via an aggregated annual return of the total number of complaints made against Family Health Services in the previous financial year.
It was decided that in 2006/07, all Special Boards, a number of National and Support Organisations and the Scottish Health Council were to submit their complaints data to ISD at the end of each financial year. Below is a list of links to the websites of these organisations if further information is required about them:
Scottish Ambulance Service
NHS 24
Scottish National Blood transfusion Service
The State Hospital for Scotland
The National Waiting Times Centre
NHS Education for Scotland
NHS Health Scotland
NHS Quality Improvement Scotland
NHS National Services Scotland
Scottish Health Council
At the time of writing, a consultation on proposed secondary legislation to support implementation of the Patient Rights (Scotland) Act 2011 is ongoing. If passed into law, these changes will make Health Boards directly responsible for reporting their complaints statistics on a quarterly and annual basis. Primary Care service providers will also be obliged to set up a complaints process and provide comprehensive quarterly information on complaints received to each territorial Health Board within whose jurisdiction they practice. This is potentially a significant change to the system of complaints reporting. When the outcome of the consultation is known, details of proposed changes to reporting will be made available on the ISD website. Further details the current complaints process and other background information is available in Appendix A.
Data Quality
Until recently, in NHS organisations across Scotland, there was a lack of consistency in the application of codes to record complaints made against an NHS service. Each Complaints Office follows general guidance about complaint recording within the NHS, but may also use their own local set of categories to register the details, or have their own interpretation of how to complete the dataset.
To help address these issues, ISD built an NHS Complaints system containing revised codes and detailed definitions and subsequently rolled out these definitions and codes nationally to ensure consistency in recording practices from Board to Board within NHS Scotland. Implementation of this new dataset for Hospital & Community Services commenced mid-way through 2008. Prior to the 2008/9 report, new codes were mapped to ensure consistency in reporting and, despite some data submission difficulties, data were received and reported against as normal.
The most up-to-date documentation on the NHS Complaints dataset is available by clicking on the links below:
NHS Complaints Definitions Document 
[1mb]
ISD Complaints System User Training Manual [7.59mb]
Instructions on how to submit data using SWIFT DVL [880kb]
Flowchart on extracting data by SWIFT for non ISD Complaints System Users [36kb]
