HEALTH spending in Scotland exceeded £12 billion for the first time last year, according to the latest annual report on NHS Scotland's performance. 

Funding for health accounted for 40 per cent of total Scottish Government spending in 2015/16, with £10.4bn of the record £12.2bn spent on health going directly to the 14 health boards for frontline services. 

A further £1.3bn was spent on the seven special health boards and Health Improvement Scotland, with £0.5 billion was used to fund a variety of other support programmes, research, and improving access to services.
The health boards also carried out £290 million worth of corporate efficiency savings, just short of the £293m target. 

The report by Paul Gray, chief executive of NHS Scotland, also provided a summary of healthcare performance during the last financial year. 
Delayed discharges fell steadily though the year, running at nine per cent below the level in 2014/15 and 94.1 per cent of patients admitted to A&E were seen and subsequently admitted, transferred or discharged within four hours, the best performance since 2011/12.

Diagnostic waiting times statistics showed that 94.6 per cent of elective patients had been waiting six weeks or less at the end of March 2016.
There were improvements in early diagnosis of lung, breast and colorectal cancers, with 25.1 per cent of cases diagnosed at the earliest stage during the combined 2014 and 2015 calendar years - up eight per cent compared to 2010 and 2011. 

Deaths among those aged under 75 - considered "premature mortality" - fell 17 per cent between 2005 and 2015. 

Two cycles of IVF were also provided on the NHS to 99.9 per cent of eligible couples within 12 months of referral in 2015/16. 

Mr Gray said: “Satisfaction with the NHS in Scotland remains high, with 90 per cent of hospital inpatients who participated in the Scottish Inpatient Patient Experience Survey in 2015 reporting their overall care and treatment to be good or excellent and 87 per cent who responded to the Health and Care Experience Survey 2015/16 rating the overall care provided by their GP practice as good or excellent.

“But we are far from complacent. I very much recognise the challenges and pressures, and that there is still much to do in tackling inequalities and improving the health of the population - which NHS Scotland cannot do on its own."