Paul Donnelly
Question:1496. Deputy Paul Donnelly asked the Minister for Health the average waiting time to see a consultant cardiothoracic surgeon at St. James’s Hospital. [12969/24]
View answerWednesday, 20 March 2024
Questions (1496)
Written answers
It is recognised that waiting times for many scheduled appointments and procedures are too long and continue to be impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic.The Department of Health continues to work with the HSE and the National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF) to identify ways to improve access to care.The 2023 Waiting List Action Plan built on the foundational work done in previous plans, achieving significant progress in relation to waiting lists, including advancements made on overall waiting list reduction for the second year in a row, and progress made in addressing long waiting times.The Department of Health is working with the HSE and the NTPF to finalise both the End of Year Report against the 2023 WLAP as well as the new WLAP 2024, which will take account of learnings from 2023 as well as the funding envelope provided for 2024.
With regard to the information requested by the Deputy, the NTPF has advised that the health system does not collect the data necessary to calculate true average wait times. In particular, the time to treatment of patients who have already received their care is not collected. The NTPF collects data on patients currently on the waiting list. The average wait times of patients who are waiting to see a consultant cardiothoracic surgeon at St. James’s Hospital is provided in the attached.