The number of hospital operations cancelled in Scotland due to factors including a lack of beds, staff and equipment rose in August.
Official figures show there were 31,215 scheduled operations across NHS Scotland during the month, of which 2,879 were cancelled either by the patient or the hospital.
A total of 662 (2.1%) of operations were cancelled by the hospital due to ''capacity or non-clinical reasons'', up from 453 (1.7%) the month before and a rise compared with August last year, when the figure was 491 (1.7%).
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Reasons can include the unavailability of beds, staff and equipment as well as employee illness, dirty equipment and theatre sessions overrunning.
Liberal Democrat health spokesman Alex Cole-Hamilton said: "There are any number of medical reasons why an operation may have to be delayed but the hard fact is that the NHS is sending hundreds of patients home before they have their operation because of capacity issues.
"This is bad for patients, bad for their families and it will be no picnic for NHS staff either.
"It often seems that there is no part of our NHS that is not under real strain. GPs are struggling. Nurses are overstretched. Cancer targets have been missed. Children have been forced to wait two years for mental health treatment. This is a picture of a health service under enormous pressure.
"It is time that the SNP government got serious about giving health boards the support they need."
READ MORE: Scottish cancer patients complain of rude staff in NHS 'chaos'
Health Secretary Shona Robison said: "Decisions to cancel planned operations are never taken lightly and we are always working with health boards to make sure we manage capacity and planning in order to keep all cancellations to a minimum.
"The small increase in the number of operations cancelled in August is a very small percentage of the overall number of scheduled procedures taking place.
"Any postponed procedures will be rescheduled at the earliest opportunity and we have made it clear to boards that patients with the greatest clinical need, such as cancer patients, should not have their operations cancelled.
READ MORE: Scottish cancer patients complain of rude staff in NHS 'chaos'
"Our £200 million investment in six new elective treatment centres will allow people to be treated more quickly for planned surgery like hip, knee and cataracts operations, and the facilities will help the NHS meet increasing demand from a growing elderly population."
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