Audit Scotland warns that: "Caring for older people in Scotland’s hospitals and care homes at a cost of billions of pounds a year is not sustainable as the elderly population continues to grow.
Audit Scotland said the Scottish Government has estimated that spending on health and social care for over-65s will have to increase from £4.5 billion to £8bn by 2031 unless there are changes to people’s wellbeing and how services are provided.
But Audit Scotland concluded that overall progress in delivering better services had so far been slow. It also found spending did not appear to be moving away from emergency and residential care and into local initiatives.
And it said the current way that services were delivered was "unsustainable".
Their answer is to keep the elderly out of hospitals and care homes and to provide support closer to home but it does not say how emergencies can be dealt with in this way. This proposal is cunningly equated with improvement in delivering services.
But we have to ask what kind of services? Without the equipment and specialist medical knowledge available in hospitals anything on offer is going to be substandard for those who require emergency treatment.
http://www.scotsman.com/news/health/elderly-care-costs-unsustainable-says-watchdog-1-3295977
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