![\"Radiographer](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2.40779966.jpg\")
There is a chronic shortage of radiographers in Scotland (Danny Lawson\/PA)<\/p>\nNHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is seeing the launch of a new community diagnostic vehicle, in a move designed to reduce the number of hospital admissions in the area.<\/p>\n
The health board currently has one of the highest emergency department admission rates in the country.<\/p>\n
The car will carry state-of-the-art diagnostic equipment, including portable X-ray, and \u2013 for the first time in the UK \u2013 equipment to conduct blood tests, urine tests and ultrasounds.<\/p>\n
These tests will be carried out by radiographers, working with wider clinical teams.<\/p>\n
The Society of Radiographers (SoR) in Scotland, which is supporting the two-year project, said enabling people to get vital tests done at home will make services more accessible, particularly for those who might struggle to travel to a hospital.<\/p>\n
Val Middleton, consultant radiologist and SoR member, said: \u201cIf you\u2019re a frail or elderly person who\u2019s fallen and is in pain, you\u2019d want to stay in your own home.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou don\u2019t want to end up stuck in hospital for days on end.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe community vehicle allows a patient to stay at home for the examination.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe patient will only be taken into hospital if they have a fracture or another condition that needs hospital care.<\/p>\n
There is a chronic shortage of radiographers in Scotland (Danny Lawson\/PA)<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd a patient in a block of flats in Glasgow maybe can\u2019t get to hospital to have diagnostic tests, so we\u2019re bringing the testing to them.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s making the services we provide more accessible to communities, reducing inequality.\u201d<\/p>\n
The SoR said earlier pilot versions of the car, which offered only an X-ray, reduced patient waiting times by an average of four hours, and freed up an equivalent of 9.3 hospital bed days per patient.<\/p>\n
This cut the number of patients being cared for in corridors and saved \u00a31,008 for each patient not admitted to hospital.<\/p>\n
As well as reducing demand on hospitals, the SoR said the scheme could also help keep Scottish radiographers in the country by offering an attractive career path that \u201ctrumps\u201d those available elsewhere.<\/p>\n
It said this could help tackle the chronic shortage of radiographers in Scotland, where vacancies in the field currently stand at 13.4% \u2013 and so help further reduce NHS waiting times for patients.<\/p>\n
Radiographers are responsible for conducting X-rays, CT and MRI scans, as well as ultrasounds and mammograms.<\/p>\n
The SoR said medics have long seen the need for a mobile diagnostics service, with Ms Middleton\u2019s own grandfather having kitted out his own X-ray vehicle in the late 1940s using an old suitcase and pieces of drainpipe.<\/p>\n
It was trialled on racehorses, but he died before it could be extended to human patients.<\/p>\n
Ms Middleton said: \u201cIt\u2019s exciting that we can actually make a difference to patients in this way.<\/p>\n
\u201cUltimately, that\u2019s why we join the profession. That\u2019s what we\u2019re here to do.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is seeing the launch of a new community diagnostic vehicle, in a move…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":681199,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7826],"tags":[748,918,4884,712,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-681198","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-glasgow","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-glasgow","10":"tag-great-britain","11":"tag-scotland","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115856982262076089","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=681198"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681198\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/681199"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=681198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=681198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=681198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}