Executive Summary from Martin McKechnie

2019-20 was another significant and progressive year for the Scottish Trauma Network. There is much to champion, and more to come in what is shaping up to be an exciting 2020-21. That this has been achieved latterly against the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic, with the many necessary twists and turns in expectation, guidance, policy, redeployment and operational initiative across all our facets and collaborations within NHS Scotland, is yet further evidence of the energy, resilience and pragmatism shown by all members of our flourishing STN family.

By this time next year we expect to have delivered a fully operational STN, by opening our final Regional Major Trauma Centres at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow, and at the Royal Infirmary in Edinburgh. This will complete the national picture alongside the MTCs at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary and Ninewells Hospital in Dundee, and support all the component services within our Regional Networks. To achieve this landmark against the turbulence of 2020 will indeed be cause for celebration.

The success of the Scottish Ambulance Service’s Trauma Desk, and its Covid-prompted transformation into a national Critical Care Desk, as well as that of ScotSTAR North operating from its new base at Aberdeen Airport, allows us to look at further developments in Red Team prehospital Critical Care delivery across Scotland.

‘The Trauma App’ collaboration between STN, the emergency department representatives from across the STN, EMQUIRE, daysix, the Digital Health & Care Institute and Innovate UK, continues to attract international interest as that project enters final development and simulation phases.

Our new Research and Innovation Group has begun its work to tell the story of the STN via data. As well as the R&I Group’s clinical research remit, there will be an assessment of the health and economic impact of the Scottish Government’s major investment in the STN.

In a new and exciting development to help tell this story, Firecrest Films, a Glasgow-based independent television production company, has been commissioned by Channel 4 to produce a flagship 6-part primetime documentary series on the work, patients and staff of the Scottish Trauma Network. It is hoped that filming will start in 2021.

Finally, as testament to the way the STN has developed and at the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport’s request, our model is being applied to support the development of several of the new Strategic Networks, where we are finding particular synergies with the Veterans and Health in Justice Networks.

Yet more interesting times ahead for the STN.

The STN Annual Report 2019/20 can be found HERE