In the latest response to the country's growing obesity crisis, more than £100,000 has been spent to give ambulance crews the ability to remove overweight patients from their homes and transport them to hospitals.

Documents obtained under Freedom of Information legislation reveal that three special ambulance teams, based in Edinburgh, Aberdeen and the Glasgow area, have been set up to deal with the problem of Scots weighing up to 36 stones.

The specialist equipment includes:

• A special lifting chair costing £2,000 which is strong enough to bear the weight of a 36-stone person while being carried up and down stairs.

• A £4,000 US-designed inflating cushion capable of lifting as much as one and a half tonnes, which can be rolled under a patient and raise them by just over two feet so they can be rolled into a bed.

• A £300 Zimmer frame capable of supporting a 47-stone patient and helping them walk.

• A toughened wheelchair costing £400 able to hold 39-stone patients.

The documents explained that the teams were being given the apparatus because most requests to transport very large patients came with just a few days' notice.

An ambulance service spokesman said:

"The need for the extra equipment has been identified through a series of studies in recent years and this is part of the response."

Dr Colin Waine, the chairman of the National Obesity Forum said: "It is a prudent move by the ambulance service to take the issue of obesity into account, but it is a very sad reflection on the state of our population that they have had to do this and that a standard ambulance and its equipment are no longer adequate to carry some people. Obesity is an epidemic and on current trends by 2020, 25% of the NHS budget will be spent on Type II diabetes."

In November, Scotland on Sunday revealed the steps that hospitals north of the Border were taking in order to cope with ever heavier patients.

Boards across Scotland have all but banned nursing staff from lifting patients unless they are small children.

Measures include a superbed capable of supporting patients weighing up to 80 stones and bed-replacement programme. In addition, it emerged that NHS Grampian is spending £402,000 replacing beds capable of taking 25-stone patients with 200 replacements at £2,000 each which can support 43 stones.