A row has broken out between the Scottish Government and researchers over a hard-hitting report that labelled health services in Scotland the worst in the UK in terms of value for money.

Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon seized on figures published by The Nuffield Trust that she said were “flawed”, having earlier said the findings were “out of date”.

However The Nuffield Trust said it was standing by its study, which said Scotland had the UK’s highest levels of poor health and lowest in-patient admissions despite having the most hospital doctors, GPs and nurses.

The row centres on the report’s 12880 figure for the total number of hospital medical staff in Scotland.

The Scottish Government said the figures had included dental staff for Scotland but not for the other countries in its comparison of medical staff numbers.

A Government spokesman said the correct figure for medical staff should have been 10,161 rather than 12,880.

But in a statement, The Nuffield Trust said the figures were obtained from published data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and had been in the public domain for past three years.

Ms Sturgeon claimed the Nuffield Trust included dental staff for Scotland but not for the other countries, rendering comparisons with England, Wales and Northern Ireland unfair.

She said the correct figure for total medical staff was 10161, significantly lower than the numbers used by the report’s authors.

Ms Sturgeon justified her attack on the independent study by emphasising the importance of defending the Scottish NHS’s reputation because its performance had “significantly improved” since the 2006 data used by the report was published.

“I am disappointed that they [The Nuffield Trust] proceeded to publish the report todayeven though they had been alerted to this potential inaccuracy,” she said. “I have already said that the information in this report is out-of-date but it has now also been shown to be flawed as a result of inaccuracy.

“The 2006 figures overestimate the numbers of doctors by 27% due to Nuffield including general dental practitioners for Scotland but not for other parts of the UK.”

Ms Sturgeon went on to state she had instructed ScottishGovernment officials to continue to scrutinise the study for further errors.

Last night the Trust defended its use of the figures, while maintaining that the headline findings still made grim reading for Scotland, even if the Government’s figure for total medical staff were correct.

“The Nuffield Trust is committed to working with NHS Scotland and the ONS to verify the figures and clarify the situation. If it transpires that the ONS figure is inaccurate, The Nuffield Trust will amend its report for the record,” a statement said.

The Trust said using the amended figure, the Scottish NHS would have treated more outpatients per doctor than Northern Ireland and delivered more day cases per staff member than Wales.

However, it would still come out bottom of the UK health services league table overall.

John Gallacher, secretary to Unison Scotland’s health group, also attacked the Nuffield Trust report. He said the number of people being dealt with by hospitals and surgeries were used in the researchers’ calculations, but they took no account of the benefit patients got from each contact.

“Unison is very concerned that a report which even its authors admit uses ‘crude productivity’ statistics and fails to measure key outcomes for patients, is seriously being recommended as a basis either for measuring how Scotland addresses poor health, or for challenging health care funding.”

He said: “The NHS deals with the consequences of poor health. Scotland’s poor health record predates devolution and will only be tackled by tackling the causes of poor health – economic, social and environmental problems.”

Mr Gallacher added that Scotland’s geography meant more spending on health care staff for the population was inevitable.

Mr Gallacher added that Scotland’s geography meant more spending on health care staff for the population was inevitable, with Highland Council serving an area the size of Belgium but a population the size of Milton Keynes.