As ministers announce steps to deliver NHS Scotland’s renewal, including investment in prevention and local health services to achieve the “full potential” of digital and technological innovation, Scotland’s health data is expected to play a central role in delivering reform.

Scott Heald, Director of Data and Digital Innovation and Head of Profession for Statistics at Public Health Scotland (PHS) explains how PHS is playing an important role in delivering on the government’s ambitions for improving patient access to care and supporting the health and care workforce.

When the Scottish government announced its ‘NHS Renewal Framework’ in January 2025, the First Minister emphasised that collaboration across the whole health and social care system will be vital to enable the people of Scotland to live longer, healthier and more fulfilling lives.

At PHS, we play a central role within this system, providing data-driven insight that equips the NHS to treat people quickly, effectively and get them home.

Accurate, credible, and useful data is fundamental to this role.

When people go to A&E or are waiting for an outpatient appointment, data tracks their progress and PHS turns this into statistics and insights that enable the NHS to see what’s working well and make meaningful improvements.

Integrity is one of our values. In my role as Head of Profession for Statistics, I'm accountable for ensuring the accuracy and integrity of the statistics we publish.

We adhere strictly to the UK Code of Practice for Statistics, ensuring our outputs are trustworthy, high-quality and of genuine value to those who depend on it for critical insights.

Driving insight, supporting decision-making

We produce a wide range of official statistics covering all aspects of health and social care.

Our publicly available data serves as a cornerstone for informed decision-making and accountability.

We also work closely with policy makers, service planners and managers to ensure they can get the most value from our statistics.

Together, we collaborate to take a data driven approach to improving services – with the aim of helping people to be seen more quickly, treated faster and out of hospital at the right time.

Through producing up-to-date, reliable and relevant data, we can enable the monitoring of NHS renewal, so that all involved can assess whether progress is being made.

We're currently working to update our statistics publications to address some data gaps and ensure that progress on all commitments can be monitored.

To make space for this crucial work, some publications may need to be paused. For example, the 18-week referral to treatment (RTT) quarterly statistics will be paused after this month’s publication.

Tools to support smarter decision-making

Producing high quality statistics is just one aspect of our work. PHS also provides a suite of specialist data tools to support health and social care service delivery.

By digging deeper into these extensive data sets, we work with public service leaders to plan, monitor and improve services.

For example, our Discovery tool gives NHS boards, local authorities and health and social care partnerships access to key healthcare information, including A&E activity, waiting times, and prescribing data. Discovery analyses and compares data, strengthening service planning and delivery, as well as performance and quality improvement in their region.

We don’t just provide data about the present.

Our ‘Whole Systems Modelling’ programme projects how services might work in the future. This allows us to understand the potential impact of changes such as introducing a new service – on health and social care demand and system pressures. This predictive tool is crucial for smarter planning decisions, helping to optimise available resources across the health and social care system.

Working together for a healthier Scotland

Data is fundamental to the successful running of the NHS.

Although less visible than an ambulance, less comforting than a healthcare professional, it nonetheless helps make sure thousands of people get timely access to the treatment they need every day.

By working together with NHS boards, local government and other partners and by continuing to invest in our data, we can unlock more insights, support smart decision-making and drive improvements in treatment and care. Which ultimately, will lead to better health outcomes for communities across Scotland.

This blog was originally published on Public Health Scotland’s website.

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