Additional £25.5 million for planned care

Delivering extra appointments and procedures for patients.

Health boards will receive an additional £25.5 million this year to allow them to deliver more planned care appointments and procedures to reduce long waits for patients, First Minister John Swinney has announced.

The additional funding will support the delivery of more outpatient appointments and inpatient/day case procedures across a variety of specialities including orthopaedics, dermatology, general surgery and gynaecology. Cardiology and paediatrics will also get extra funding.

This new support takes total additional investment to £135.5 million in 2025-26 to help the National Health Service maintain progress on reducing waiting lists.

Recent figures show the total list size and longest waits are coming down. There has also been an increase of more than 31,000 appointments and procedures from April to September this year compared to same period in 2024.

The latest figures show our plan to support Scotland’s NHS is working, delivering real benefits for patients. We have already provided £110 million of additional targeted funding this year to tackle the longest waits. Now we are providing a further boost to deliver more appointments and procedures, taking the total additional funding to £135.5 million for 2025-26.

I am determined to build on the progress being achieved by hardworking staff in our health service, like those I met today at Queen Elizabeth University Hospital. We want to help them provide the care and treatment patients need and expect – and we are already seeing results

Not only are the total list size and longest waits coming down, but we are treating more people than last year. There is still work to be done, but these are very welcome improvements.

Under my leadership, the people of Scotland can expect a strong National Health Service delivering patient care of the highest possible quality.

– THE FIRST MINSITER, DURING HIS VISIT TO QUEEN ELIZABETH UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL IN GLASGOW

Background

The additional £25.5 million will be shared between the following health boards:

• Ayrshire and Arran
• Fife
• Grampian
• Greater Glasgow and Clyde
• Highland
• Lanarkshire
• Lothian
• Shetland
• Tayside

In NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, as at 30 September 2025, new outpatient ongoing waits over 52 weeks had decreased by 17.6% and inpatient/day case ongoing waits over 52 weeks had decreased by 5.7% compared to the previous month.

Reduction in NHS waiting lists – gov.scot