The data presented here are obtained from the Scottish Morbidity Record 02 (SMR02) which is submitted by maternity hospitals to ISD, who have collected this information since 1975.

A wide range of information is collected on the SMR02 - some of which are detailed below:

• mother - age, height, smoking history, previous obstetric history.
• birth - induction, analgesia, method of delivery, outcome.
• baby - apgar score, sex, gestation, weight.

Although there is no legal requirement to submit these data to ISD, the level of submission falls only slightly short of the known  total number of births occurring each year. As a result, Scotland has some of the best information on  pregnancy and births available.

This release includes data for the two financial year periods ending 31st March 2006 and 2007.  We were unable to update this website last year due to a large amount of incomplete SMR02 returns but this has now been resolved.

A summary of the key points is available here .

GROS vs SMR02

For year end March 2007 there were 55,064 live births recorded on SMR02 records.  For the same time period there were 56,331 live births registered with the General Register Office for Scotland (GROS).  The shortfall is approximately 2 percent and the majority of this is due to incomplete data submissions from maternity units with the remainder due to a variety of reasons including home births and births in Non-NHS hospitals.  Further details can be found on our notes page . 

Tables & charts can be accessed through the menu on the left hand side.