Dying patients can wait up to three months for the social services they need, according to a report which warns of a care crisis in Scotland for the frail and terminally ill.
Four major organisations, including Marie Curie and Hospice UK, have joined forces to call for a fundamental rethink of the way that people are looked after north of the border at the end of their lives. Their report builds on an investigation by Gordon Aikman, a motor neurone disease sufferer, which found that in Scotland last year 276 people died waiting for their social care package to start.
The new report has revealed that some local authorities can provide the social care vulnerable people need at home as soon as their requirements have