Scotland's accident and emergency departments have produced their best waiting times figures since weekly monitoring began.
In the week ending Sunday June 28, A&E departments treated a total of 94.7% of patients within four hours - just short of meeting the Scottish Government's interim target of 95%.
That is up from 93.9% the previous week, and compares to 86.1% in the week ending February 22 when weekly monitoring began.
Hospitals dealt with 24,785 cases in A&E in the most recent week, with 1,305 people having to wait more than four hours to be seen and then subsequently admitted, transferred or discharged, official figures show.
The Scottish Government has set an interim goal of treating 95% of people in four hours in advance of meeting the full target of 98%.
Public Health Minister Maureen Watt said: "Today's figures show A&E performance is steadily improving, with weekly figures getting closer to meeting our world-leading targets.
"We cannot afford to lose momentum now and our focus remains on hitting that target, ensuring the best possible service for patients across Scotland."
The majority of NHS boards achieved the 95% interim target, but four - NHS Ayrshire and Arran (93.6%), NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde (92.6%), NHS Lanarkshire (93.9%) and NHS Lothian (94.8%) - failed to do so.
Both NHS Highland and NHS Tayside met the full target, respectively treating 98% and 98.5% of patients within four hours.
The new South Glasgow University Hospital, which was officially opened by the Queen last week, had the worst performance, with 88.6% of A&E patients treated within the target time.
The Scottish Government has already sent in a specialist support team to the hospital in a bid to improve its performance.
Ms Watt added that across Scotland, the number of patients having to wait more than eight hours in A&E had "lessened by nearly 90% since weekly reporting began".
While 734 A&E patients had to wait more than eight hours in the first week of monitoring in February, this had fallen to 81 in the week ending June 28.
Ms Watt said: "It is vital that, with ongoing support from the Scottish Government, health boards continue to deliver strong performance across Scotland in the summer months to ensure they are in the best position they can be heading into next winter.
"We have put record funding and staffing in place and we are committed to tackling delayed discharge, including through the integration of health and social care.
"That means we have the strong foundations in place to ensure our NHS continues to deliver quick, high-quality care for the people of Scotland."
But Labour health spokeswoman Jenny Marra hit out at the Government, saying: "The figures released today show that A&E performance under the SNP Government in Edinburgh has gone backwards in the last year despite the heroic efforts of our hardworking NHS staff.
"The flagship Glasgow hospital is still not close to hitting performance targets, despite expert support teams being sent into the hospital weeks ago.
"The truth about our NHS in Scotland is that it has been underfunded by an SNP Government that has squeezed spending on our NHS in Scotland harder than the Tories. That decision has let down patients and staff across Scotland."
Liberal Democrat health spokesman Jim Hume said: "Any improvement in the figures is to be welcomed but I am sure that NHS staff would be the first to agree that too many patients are still facing an extended wait for treatment.
"This chronic inability of the Scottish Government to give doctors and nurses the support they need has had a fundamental impact on their ability to treat patients. They need to step up and deliver on the promises they have made to NHS staff and patients.
"The SNP have taken their eye off the ball on the NHS and medical staff and patients alike are paying the price."
He also said it is "concerning that weeks after troubleshooters were sent into South Glasgow that performance in A&E is still lagging behind the performance target".
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article