Scottish health boards and/or hospitals currently taking part in the Martha’s Rule pilot: FOI Review

Information requested

Original request 202500493182

The Scottish Government is currently testing a number of pilots for Martha’s Rule within NHS Scotland, and you are monitoring outcomes and exploring a consistent, nationwide rollout.

I would be grateful if you could provide further detail regarding the pilot programme, specifically:

1. A list of the Scottish health boards and/or hospitals currently taking part in the Martha’s Rule pilot.
2. The start date of each pilot (or planned start date if not yet live).
3. The scope of each pilot (adult inpatients only, paediatrics, maternity, etc).
4. Any interim data or outcomes available (e.g., number of calls, number of escalations, number of interventions) and the criteria by which success is being measured.
5. The anticipated timeframe for a full nationwide rollout across Scotland (if available).
6. The communication strategy in place to raise awareness of the scheme among patients, families and staff (so that those in hospital know how to escalate their concerns).

Response

I have now completed my review of our response to your request under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA) for:

An internal review of the response to my FOI request, reference 202500493182.

I am dissatisfied with the response for the following reasons:

1. The response states that the Scottish Government holds no information about Martha’s Rule pilots in NHS Scotland, while also stating that it is “aware some Boards have done so”. These two statements are contradictory and suggest that relevant information must exist somewhere within the organisation or its sponsored bodies.

2. Given that the Scottish Government has publicly committed to working with Healthcare Improvement Scotland and NHS Boards to “learn from their experiences”, it is not credible that no information is held about which Boards are involved, what is being piloted, or when this work began.

3. My request was for national-level information about governance, oversight, pilots and planning. Suggesting that I contact 14 individual Health Boards does not address the question of what information the Scottish Government itself holds or should hold in relation to a national patient safety policy area.

4. If no information is held, I would expect a clear explanation of why the Scottish Government is not collecting or holding any information on a matter of this importance and which part of the organisation has responsibility for this policy area. I therefore request a full internal review of the searches carried out, the interpretation of my request, and the decision to issue a Section 17(1) notice.

Conclusion of the review

I have concluded that the original decision should be confirmed, but that there is some additional material out of scope of your request that is held on Scottish Government systems and could be issued to you in the interests of being as helpful as possible.

It may be helpful to you to know how I arrived at this decision. I undertook a thorough review of the records held in relation to your original request, and subsequently completed a fresh interrogation of Scottish Government records. I could find no information that would answer any part of your request, and therefore this review confirms the earlier notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested. This applies to each of the separate points in your original request and I apologise that this may not have been explicitly clear in the original response.

However, two documents were found that I think may be helpful to you, and I am therefore releasing these to you outwith the terms of your request under FOISA, subject to redaction of personal information and material that is not relevant to the terms of your request.

One is a letter from the Scottish Government’s National Clinical Lead for Quality & Safety and Strategic Advisor for Person-Centred Care & Quality to Scottish Executive Nurse Directors (SEND) and Scottish Association of Medical Directors, asking for their feedback and support “as we consider the outcomes of the pilot in England”.

The other is a note of a meeting between the Scottish Government and SEND on June 20th, where this was subsequently discussed. In this meeting note, a representative of NHS Lanarkshire refers to work at Hairmyres Hospital linked to Martha’s Law and you may therefore find it helpful to approach NHS Lanarkshire for more information: Freedom of Information - NHS Lanarkshire. If you wish to write to NHS Lanarkshire their postal address is:

NHS Lanarkshire
14 Beckford Street
Hamilton
ML3 0TA

You may also find it helpful to contact Scotland’s other health boards, as those undertaking local pilots would be expected to hold detailed information that it appears the Scottish Government does not. You can find more information about each board at Organisations – Scotland's Health on the Web.

About FOI

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

FOI 202600503820 - Information released - Documents

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