Louise O'Reilly
Question:819. Deputy Louise O'Reilly asked the Minister for Health the number of persons on a health-based waiting in the community or acute list by LHO at the end of February 2020 or the latest date available. [3591/20]
View answerThursday, 5 March 2020
Questions (819)
Written answers
I am conscious that waiting times are often unacceptably long and of the burden that this places on patients and their families. In this regard, the Government is committed to improving waiting times for hospital appointments and procedures.
Budget 2020 announced further increased investment in tackling waiting lists, with funding to the National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF) increasing from €75 million in 2019 to €100 million in 2020. The NTPF will work with the hospital system to provide additionality to improve access to inpatient/daycase treatment and with a particular focus on hospital outpatient services. In this regard, I would encourage all hospital groups and individual hospitals to engage with the NTPF to identify waiting list proposals this year.
The latest published NTPF figures, which are also available at www.ntpf.ie/home/nwld.htm show that at the end of January 2020 there were:
- 67,303 patients on the IPDC waiting list. Of these, 58% (38,845) are waiting over 3 months and 22% (14,815) are waiting over 9 months.
- 22,231 patients on the GI Scopes waiting list. Of these, 50% (11,206) are waiting over 3 months and 14% (3,113) are waiting over 9 months.
- 556,770 on the outpatients waiting list. Of these, 72% (400,864) are waiting over 3 months and 31% (173,256) are waiting over 12 months.
As requested by the Deputy, the waiting list data broken down to acute hospital level is outlined in the attached documents.
In relation to the data requested concerning community waiting lists by LHO, I have asked the HSE to respond to the Deputy directly.