Researchers have claimed significant health and financial savings could be achieved by changing when hospital outpatient and GP appointments are scheduled.

Psychologists at the University of Glasgow estimate that 12 per cent of all outpatient appointments at UK hospitals are not kept, costing the health system an estimated £600 million a year.

Writing in the PLoS One open access journal, Dr Rob Jenkins and David Ellis, of the university's School of Pyschology, believe that even a small reduction in the percentage of missed appointments could save the NHS significant sums.

Dr Jenkins said: "If you could cut non-attendance by just a tenth – from 12 per cent to 10.8 per cent, you could save the NHS £60 million a year. It would also improve patients’ health and reduce the risk of illness."

The research duo studied two sets of anonymous data approved by the  Information Services Division Scotland’s ethical procedures, beginning with attendance records for 4,538,294 outpatient hospital appointments across Scotland between 1 January 2008 and 31 December 2010.

They then examined the attendance records for 10,895 appointments at a single GP clinic in Glasgow.

Dr Jenkins added: "Our analysis of both sets of data shows that more appointments are missed at the start of the week than at the end of the week.

"Mondays are worst for missed appointments. But over the course of the week attendance steadily improves. Fridays have the fewest no-shows.

David Ellis said: "Although the causes of non-attendance aren’t well understood, we believe significant health and financial savings could be achieved very easily and cheaply by scheduling appointments towards the end of the week, rather than at the start of the week.

"Interestingly, however, we found that hospitals tend to do the opposite — they load appointments at the start of the week."

The researchers believe that emotional responses show some medical appointments may be harder for patients to face on some weekdays than on others

Dr Jenkins said: "Recent psychological studies have shown that different days of the week evoke distinct emotional responses.

"Mondays have the most negative response; Fridays the most positive. And emotional tone brightens steadily over the intervening days.

"Missed appointments seem to follow the psychological peaks and troughs of the weekly cycle, with emotionally positive days boosting patient resilience and improving attendance.

"This interpretation chimes with many of the psychological reasons patients give for missing their appointments: fear of bad news; fear of unpleasant treatment; or even negative relationships with medical staff."

Ellis added: "Our study clearly shows that appointments at the beginning of the week are missed more often than those at the end of the week.

"A simple strategy for reducing missed appointments could be to schedule appointments towards the end of the week wherever possible."