Duty of Candour

All health and social care services providers in Scotland have a duty of candour. This is a legal requirement, which means that when unintended or unexpected events happen that result in death or harm as defined in the duty of candour provisions of the Health (Tobacco. Nicotine Etc. and Care) (Scotland) Act 2016 and the Duty of Candour Procedure (Scotland) Regulations 2018, the people affected understand what has happened, receive an apology, and that organisations learn how to improve for the future and apply appropriate learning.

Managing risk is an important part of delivering high quality health and social care services. In turn, candour promotes responsibility for developing safer systems, better engages staff in improving services and creates greater trust in people who use the services, either first hand or on behalf of someone else.

An important part of this duty is that we write an annual report outlining how we have applied the Duty of Candour across all of our services.