Healthcare Analytics for NHS Scotland Health Boards

NHS Scotland operates through a structure of 14 regional Health Boards — a model distinct from England's Integrated Care Systems — alongside national bodies including Public Health Scotland and Healthcare Improvement Scotland. NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is the largest Board in the UK with a population of 1.2 million, incorporating some of the most deprived communities in Western Europe across the north and east of the city. NHS Lothian serves Edinburgh and the Lothians (approximately 900,000 people), NHS Grampian covers Aberdeen and the north-east, and NHS Tayside encompasses Dundee and the Angus and Perthshire hinterland. Taken together, these Boards handle the bulk of secondary and tertiary care in Scotland, but the system also includes Boards like NHS Highland — the largest geographic Health Board in the UK — and the island Boards of NHS Orkney, NHS Shetland, and NHS Western Isles, where geography fundamentally shapes what good analytics looks like.

Scotland's drug death crisis is the most acute public health emergency in the UK. With a rate of 35.6 deaths per 100,000 population recorded in 2022 — the highest in Europe — organisations like NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, NHS Lothian, and NHS Tayside face an ongoing requirement for real-time substance misuse surveillance analytics that can direct naloxone distribution, residential rehabilitation pathway capacity, and community addiction services. Alongside drug deaths, alcohol-related harm analytics and mental health waiting time performance are central Scottish Government HEAT targets against which every Health Board is assessed. Vizier gives analysts in each Board the ability to interrogate these datasets without waiting for Public Health Scotland reporting cycles.

NHS Scotland operates under the governance of the Scottish Government's Health Directorates, with Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS) serving as the scrutiny and improvement body. Public Health Scotland provides national epidemiological intelligence and publishes the annual drug death statistics that drive political and operational priorities at Board level. The Scottish Medicines Consortium advises on drug licensing decisions affecting prescribing analytics, while the Information Services Division (ISD, now part of Public Health Scotland) maintains the national data infrastructure including SMR (Scottish Morbidity Record) returns, which Health Boards must submit for all inpatient and day-case activity.

NHS Scotland organisations are subject to UK GDPR as applied in Scotland, with additional obligations under the NHS Scotland Data Sharing Framework. The Caldicott principles apply to patient data use, and NHS Scotland has developed specific guidance on data linkage through the Electronic Data Research and Innovation Service (eDRIS). Health Boards must comply with the Cyber Resilience Framework for Health and Care as well as annual Information Governance requirements equivalent in scope to the NHS England Data Security and Protection Toolkit.