Waiting times for pain management services
Quarter ending 30 September 2025

About this release

This release by Public Health Scotland (PHS) presents statistics on waiting times for pain management services within NHS Scotland. It includes statistics on the number of referrals to these services, the number of patients seen at a first outpatient appointment, the length of their wait, the number of patients who were still waiting to be seen at the end of the quarter, and how long they had been waiting. These services provide chronic pain assessment and management and are delivered by multi-disciplinary teams.

The ways in which pain management services are delivered has changed. Traditionally, the focus was on new outpatient appointments at consultant-led clinics but more recently, these services have introduced alternative pathways that make use of increasingly multi-disciplinary approaches to help patients manage their chronic pain.

A short life working group was convened in March 2023 to review and agree a revision to the existing data collection that would see data collected on all first appointments with pain management services (medic, i.e. consultant or doctor, physiotherapist, nurse, multi-disciplinary team and information session) to reflect these alternative pathways now on offer to patients. The group's recommendations were agreed by the Pain Management Task Force in February 2024.

A pilot of the new data collection ran alongside the existing data collection covering data from the quarter ending 31 March 2024 to the quarter ending 30 June 2025. Following review, it was agreed to move to using the new, extended data collection only for the quarter ending 30 September 2025 onwards. This is the first release of these data and it covers the time period from the quarter ending 31 March 2024 to the quarter ending 30 September 2025.

We are continuing to develop these statistics and welcome feedback via phs.waitingtimes@phs.scot.

Main points

• During the quarter ending 30 September 2025, 5,791 patients were referred to a pain management service. This compares to 5,838 referrals in the previous quarter, a decrease of 0.8%, and to 5,859 a year ago in the quarter ending 30 September 2024, a decrease of 1.2%.
• During the same quarter, 3,510 patients attended their first outpatient appointment with a pain management service. This compares to 2,745 patients in the previous quarter, an increase of 27.9% and to 2,930 patients seen a year earlier in the quarter ending 30 September 2024, an increase of 19.8%.
• Of those seen at a pain management service in the latest quarter, 55.2% of patients waited 12 weeks or less to be seen, compared to a quarterly average of 56.9% in January to June 2025 and 57.9% in 2024. The proportion of patients who experienced longer waits has increased. For instance, 14.5% of patients waited 52 weeks or more to be seen in the latest quarter, compared to an average each quarter of 12.4% in the first half of 2025 and 6.2% in 2024.
• In the most recent quarter, the proportion of patients who attended a pain early information session has increased when compared to the first two quarters of 2025 and to 2024. Of those seen at a pain management service in the latest quarter, 36.8% of patients attended a pain early information session as their first appointment, compared to an average per quarter of 30.6% during January to June 2025 and 27.0% in 2024.

Trend chart showing data from quarter ending 31 March 2024 to quarter ending 30 September 2025 with bars showing the number of patients seen per quarter. Each bar is broken down by the type of clinician seen: Pain Early Information session (darker blue bar), Medic (blue bar), Physiotherapist (dark grey bar), Nurse (pale grey bar), MDT clinic (dark magenta bar) and Other (pale magenta bar).

Close

Number of patients seen for a first appointment at a pain management service by the type of clinician seen from the quarter ending 31 March 2024 to the quarter ending 30 September 2025

• On 30 September 2025, 6,490 patients were waiting for their first appointment at a pain management service. This is a decrease of 6.2% compared to the previous quarter, when there were 6,916 patients waiting and a decrease of 0.5% compared to a year ago on 30 September 2024, when there were 6,520 patients waiting.
• Of those waiting to be seen at the end of each quarter, the proportion of patients who had been waiting longer for their first appointment has decreased. At 30 September 2025, 3.6% of patients had already been waiting 52 weeks or more, compared to a quarterly average of 6.9% in January to June 2025 and 6.7% in 2024. Most of these patients were waiting to be treated in NHS Dumfries & Galloway, NHS Lanarkshire and NHS Tayside. Staff vacancies are reported as the main factor that has contributed to some patients experiencing longer waits.
• In the most recent quarter, the proportion of patients who were waiting to attend a pain early information session as their first appointment has increased when compared to the first two quarters of 2025 and to 2024. Of those waiting at a pain management service in the latest quarter, 26.6% of patients were waiting for a pain early information session, compared to on average 23.9% in January to June 2025 and 21.0% in 2024.

Background

Chronic pain is defined as pain that carries on for longer than 12 weeks despite medication or treatment. Further information on chronic pain can be found on the NHS Inform website.

Statistics on the length of wait in this publication are reported against the national 12 week new outpatient standard. This was discussed and agreed at the Pain Management Task Force meeting in December 2024. The data presented here have been adjusted for periods of patient unavailability based on the 2012 version of the NHSScotland Waiting Times Guidance. The revised Waiting Times Guidance (2023) will apply to some of the statistics from the March 2026 release. See the full report for details.

Some pain management services took part in the waiting list initiative to reduce waiting times ensuring that by March 2026, no one is waiting longer than 52 weeks for their first outpatient appointment. Further information on this waiting list initiative can be found on the Scottish Government website: Improving access to treatment - NHS Scotland operational improvement plan - gov.scot.

Further information

The next release of this publication will be 10 March 2026.