{"id":98285,"date":"2025-08-28T08:33:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-28T08:33:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/98285\/"},"modified":"2025-08-28T08:33:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-28T08:33:07","slug":"seven-year-wait-for-mental-health-care-revealed-as-horrific-delays-condemned","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/98285\/","title":{"rendered":"Seven-year wait for mental health care revealed as \u2018horrific\u2019 delays condemned"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Scottish Government has come under fire for \u201chorrifically long\u201d waiting times for mental health treatment for adults \u2013 with data showing one patient in the Highlands waited more than seven years before starting to get help.<\/p>\n

Figures released under freedom of information legislation show the patient, who started receiving treatment in 2024-25, had waited 2,736 days.<\/p>\n

In NHS Dumfries and Galloway, a patient waited 1,265 days \u2013 more than 180 weeks \u2013 before beginning their treatment last year, with another patient in NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde waiting 1,229 days.<\/p>\n

A patient in NHS Highland who is currently waiting for treatment has been on the list for 200 weeks, the figures obtained by Scottish Liberal Democrats show, while a patient in NHS Fife has been waiting 146 weeks.<\/p>\n

NHS Forth Valley meanwhile confirmed 215 adults have been waiting more than 24 months for mental health treatment.<\/p>\n

The figures also show NHS Grampian and NHS Lanarkshire had 36 patients who waited more than a year before they started getting treatment in 2024-25, with NHS Forth Valley having 35 such patients, while there were 33 in NHS Dumfries and Galloway.<\/p>\n

Scottish Lib Dem leader Alex Cole-Hamilton accused SNP ministers of having put \u201cmental health patients on hold\u201d for the past two decades, \u201cactively harming their ability to get the treatment and support they need in good time\u201d.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cWith hundreds of patients still facing horrifically long waits, it\u2019s clear the SNP lack any kind of vision or plan for fixing this crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said the Lib Dems are \u201cthe party of mental health\u201d, and \u201cwant to drive down waiting times by ramping up training of mental health first aiders and new staff, as well as rolling out more specialists in GP surgeries and A&E departments\u201d.<\/p>\n

Mr Cole-Hamilton added Liberal Democrat policies of increasing taxes on social media giants could also help \u201cprovide funding for these vital services\u201d.<\/p>\n

A Scottish Government spokesperson said: \u201cWe understand the distress caused by delays in accessing mental health support and long waits are not acceptable.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe latest Public Health Scotland data shows that more than 74,000 people started treatment in psychological therapies (PT) last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cHalf of patients were starting treatment within three weeks of referral in quarter ending March 2025 and there was a significant increase of 7.5% of patients starting treatment in the last quarter.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis has been made possible by the hard work of our psychology services workforce which has increased by 61.8% in the last decade.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have set clear expectations for NHS Boards and we will continue working closely with those who are not meeting the standard to drive the improvements we need to see.\u201d<\/p>\n

STV News is now on WhatsApp<\/p>\n

Get all the latest news from around the country<\/p>\n

Follow STV News <\/a>Follow STV News on WhatsApp<\/p>\n

Scan the QR code on your mobile device for all the latest news from around the country<\/p>\n

\"WhatsApp<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Scottish Government has come under fire for \u201chorrifically long\u201d waiting times for mental health treatment for adults…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":98286,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[102,1906,6623,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-98285","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mental-health","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-mental-health","10":"tag-mentalhealth","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom","13":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=98285"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98285\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/98286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}