Scottish Health Survey 2018: main report - revised 2020

Statistics on mental health and wellbeing, general health, cardiovascular conditions and caring, alcohol, smoking, diet, physical activity, obesity and respiratory.

An amended version of the Scottish Health Survey 2018 Main Report was published on 21 February 2020 as a result of issues with how age standardisation had been applied. This has resulted in a number of small scale changes, details of which are outlined in the word document in the supporting files section.

Editors' acknowledgements

Firstly, we would like to thank the 4,810 adults and 1,980 children across Scotland for giving up their time to participate in the 2018 survey and for welcoming our interviewers into their home.

We would also like to thank those colleagues who contributed to the survey and this report. In particular we would like to thank:

• The interviewers who worked on the project. The success of the survey is in large part down to the commitment and professionalism they apply to their work every day.
• Isla Dougall and Maria-Clorinda Luck for their meticulous work on the Scottish Health Survey this year.
• Stephen Hinchliffe for expert analysis advice and support.
• The authors of the chapters: Isla Dougall, Victoria Wilson, Stephen Hinchliffe, Konstantina Vosnaki, Lucy Dean, Kasmita Mirani, Chi Keng Cheong.
• Richard Boreham, Laura Brown and Ben Stocker whose hard work, attention to detail, knowledge and expertise have been invaluable to the preparation of the survey data as well as extensive analysis input to the report.
• Shanna Christie for all her work in developing and launching the 2018 survey.
• Other research colleagues and partners, in particular: Lesley Birse, Andy MacGregor (ScotCen Social Research); Jess Bailey, Ana Cristina, Kirsty Driscoll (NatCen Social Research) and freelancers Sean Willmott and Amanda Gratwick; Aziz Sheikh (The University of Edinburgh); Geraldine McNeil (University of Aberdeen); Linsay Gray (University of Glasgow).
• Emma Fenn and colleagues in the NatCen Social Research Operations team.
• The area manager Julie Foster, field performance managers Janette Read, Deborah Healey, Iain McKay and Claire Hamilton as well as Jo Taylor, National Field Nurse Manager, Stephen Booth, Sue Roche and Chris Bryan.
• The principal programmer, Iain Templeton.
• Bryan Mason and the team of dedicated coders.
• The Survey Doctor, Dr Sangeeta Dhami.

We would also like to express our thanks to Julie Fletcher, Helen Snowden and Dr Chris Shaw of the Freeman Hospital, Newcastle, to the laboratory staff at the Royal Victoria Infirmary, Newcastle, and to Dr Mira Doig and colleagues at ABS Laboratories in Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, for their continuing helpfulness and efficiency in processing and analysing the saliva and urine samples on the study.

Ethical approval for the study was granted by the Research Committee for Wales (17/WA/0371). We are grateful to the committee, and its co-ordinator Dr Corrine Scott, for their careful scrutiny and on-going support.

Finally, special thanks are due to Julie Landsberg, Scott Jackson, Morag Shepherd, Xanthippi Gounari, Jamie Robertson, Ben Cook and colleagues in the Scottish Government Health Directorates, for their continued support at all stages of the project.

Joanne McLean, Lucy Dean and Stephen Hinchliffe.