Currently, laboratory samples are transported by road and can take up to five hours between NHS Borders and NHS Lothian due to due to needing to make multiple pick-ups.

However, Project CAELUS - led by AGS Airports in partnership with NHS Scotland - saw this delivery could take 35 minutes. 

A three-week flight trial between the two boards took place between the Edinburgh BioQuarter next to the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh and Borders General Hospital in Melrose.

Dr Tracey Gillies, medical director and executive lead for innovation at NHS Lothian, said: ‘Lothian and the surrounding areas are very diverse, from city to country and coastal living. Drones could play an important role in helping to transport samples for testing or speed up the delivery of critical medical supplies.

'These exciting trial flights have been a collaborative effort between our clinical leads, South East Innovation Hub and partner organisations and I look forward to seeing further developments with this project.'

Project CALEUS is working with 16 consortium partners to deliver what will be the first national drone network that can transport essential medicines, bloods and other medical supplies throughout Scotland including to remote communities.

Fiona Smith, project director for Project CAELUS, added: ‘This is an important milestone for our project and we now look forward to testing more potential use cases by drone across Scotland in the coming months.'