Average waiting times to speak to someone at NHS 24’s mental health hub helpline rose to nearly 15 minutes in January 2021.

A total of 25,000 calls have been abandoned by the person seeking help without being answered since 1^st March 2020, making up just over a quarter of all calls to the service.

The issue was highlighted this week by Scottish Labour in parliament yesterday.

Party leader Anas Sarwar said people in crisis were being let down:

“Almost 25,000 mental health crisis calls during the pandemic whereby individuals have built up the courage to pick up the phone and call for help but those calls have been ignored.

“Today, Labour is publishing data that shows the steady increase in waiting times and in the number of abandoned calls to the mental health hub during the pandemic.

“In March of last year—at the start of the pandemic—133 calls went unanswered. In the latest month of this year for which data is available, that number is 5,452, which is 40 times higher. Those people are in crisis.

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon agreed the figure for missed or unanswered calls was not acceptable.

In a statement, NHS 24 Director of Service Delivery Stephanie Phillips said the hub had supported more than 70,000 people and had rapidly expanded over the pandemic.

The figures, obtained through Freedom of Information requests by Scottish Labour, show average waiting times and the percentage of abandoned calls have risen steadily.

Average daily waiting times have increased from less than a minute in March 2020 to almost 15 minutes in January 2021.

This includes spikes where average waits reached nearly more than 20 minutes.

This January of this year an average of 42% of calls were abandoned before they were answered, compared to 5% of calls that were abandoned in March 2020.

The mental health hub was promoted by the Scottish government as part of its redesign of urgent care services, which encourages the public to seek alternative forms of support instead of A&E for issues that are not life threatening.

Stephanie Philips revealed that almost 2 million people have sought help:

“NHS 24’s mental health services have seen a significant increase in calls and website visits since the start of the pandemic, and we have provided support to almost 1.9 million people in mental health distress via our online and telephony services.

“Since March 2020 the Mental Health Hub alone has supported more than 70,000 callers in mental health distress, having rapidly expanded our operational hours to a 24/7 service to provide the additional urgent help required in these difficult times.

“We handle a wide range of mental health calls and for some callers they may require support for complex mental health issues that can require intensive and prolonged levels of support.

“NHS 24 is absolutely committed to the provision of high quality, effective mental health support to the people of Scotland during these challenging times.”

Read more: A&E call-ahead changes go live across Scotland; Waits get longer as 111 calls hit record high; NHS Scotland £60m call centre deal revealed

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