Cancelled planned operations
Month Ending 31 March 2025

About this release

This release by Public Health Scotland (PHS) provides a monthly update on the number of operations in NHSScotland that were cancelled the day before or on the day of the procedure. Cancellation reasons are grouped into cancelled by the hospital for clinical reasons, cancelled by the patient, cancelled by the hospital due to capacity or non-clinical reasons, cancelled for other reasons and cancelled for unknown reason.

Main points

• During March 2025, there were 25,226 operations planned to take place across NHSScotland. This is 6.9% higher (+1,626) than the number planned in the same month a year previously in March 2024 (23,600).
• In the latest 12 month period from April 2024 to March 2025, there was a 2.6% increase (+7,212) in the number of planned operations compared to the previous 12 month period. From April 2023 to March 2024, there was a 7.6% increase (+19,761) compared to the 12 months to March 2023. This demonstrates that while a year-on-year increase is still being observed as services rebuild following the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, the rate of growth has slowed.
• During the latest month, 8.2% (2,065) of planned operations were cancelled the day before or on the day the patient was due to be treated in NHSScotland. This is the same as the rate reported during March 2024 (8.2%; 1,934) and lower than the rates seen in March 2023 (9%; 2,259) and March 2022 (9.6%; 2,089).
• Across NHS boards, the percentage of cancelled planned operations ranged from 5.2% to 12.2% this month.
• Of all planned operations during March 2025 in NHSScotland, 816 (3.2%) were cancelled by the hospital for clinical reasons, 719 (2.9%) were cancelled by the patient, 449 (1.8%) were cancelled by the hospital due to capacity or non-clinical reasons, and 81 (0.3%) were cancelled for other reasons.

A trend chart showing NHSScotland level data for total planned operations and percentage of cancelled planned operations, by reason, from January 2020 up to March 2025. Total number of planned operations has been steadily increasing since the start of COVID-19 emergency measures in March 2020. Although they have yet to return to pre-pandemic levels. Over the past 12 months, the percentage of cancelled planned operations due to clinical reasons has stayed consistent at approximately 3%. The same was true for the most recent percentages of cancelled planned operations by patients (2.9%) and due to non-clinical/capacity reason (1.8%), which both saw increases after consistent trends with a spike in December 2022 and small increases in January 2024. The percentage of cancelled planned operations due to other reasons has remained consistently low since May 2020 and is currently 0.3%. A new cancellation reason of "unknown" has been added because of the NHS Orkney data quality issues between April 2022 and May 2024 (ranging between 0.1% and 0.3%).

Close

NHSScotland total planned operations and percentage of cancelled planned operations by reason to March 2025

Please note that fluctuation in the trend in the monthly number of planned operations will be caused partly by variation in the number of working days per month, i.e. weekdays excluding public holidays, as theatre capacity tends to be lower at weekends and on public holidays.

Background

These statistics are released monthly. Data for this publication are submitted from NHS board theatre systems. Further information on the reasons for cancellation can be found on the Cancelled Planned Operations section of our website.

Further information

The next release of this publication will be 3 June 2025.

PHS is currently undertaking a review of the statistical publications we produce; all planned care waiting times outputs are being reviewed and this may lead to a change in the content, layout and frequency of future publications. Any substantial changes will be announced ahead of implementation. For more information, please contact us at phs.waitingtimes@phs.scot.