Long wait for operations at Notts hospitals NEARLY 1,000 STILL ON LIST FOR SURGERY AFTER A YEAR
NEARLY 1,000 people have been made to wait for more than a year for treatment at Nottinghamshire hospitals.
At the end of September this year, 969 people had been waiting for more than 12 months for elective care, such as hip and knee operations, at Sherwood Forest Hospitals Trust and Nottingham University Hospitals Trust.
This is a jump from 720 the previous month in August.
By comparison, in February 2020, there was no one who had been waiting for more than a year.
Nottingham hospital bosses cancelled some cancer operations in the county due to “pressure on intensive care units”, it was revealed last month.
Ear, Nose and Throat (ENT) has the highest number of people waiting more than a year at 223.
Overall, the proportion of people waiting less than the 18-week target time at trusts covering Nottinghamshire has improved.
At the end of September, 67.1% of people had been waiting less than 18 weeks from referral, up from 61.5% in August. However, that is still down from 88.3% in February this year.
A spokesperson at Nottingham University Hospitals said: “We are really sorry that some of our patients have had to wait longer for their treatment recently.
“Before the pandemic, we very rarely had a single patient waiting over a year.
“We’ve had to make some really difficult decisions so that we can keep our patients safe. We are prioritising our most urgent cases, including cancer, and are working hard to see as many patients as we can with valuable support from local private hospitals.
“Our specialists are regularly reviewing patients to ensure that we are prioritising our limited capacity appropriately. If you have any concerns about your health it is vitally important that you raise these with your doctor.”
A spokesperson for Sherwood Forest Hospitals said: “Sherwood Forest Hospitals continues to prioritise our most urgent patients and patients who need cancer treatment.
“We know that we have patients who have been waiting longer than we would like to have their operations, but we would like to reassure them that we are doing all we can to see as many patients as we can during the pandemic.
“We assess our elective care plans on a daily basis and we have worked hard to ensure that we continue to carry out as many operations and procedures as we can in these uncertain times.
“Our nurse specialists have been undertaking calls with patients who are waiting over a year and last week we wrote to just over 1,700 patients who are waiting for a procedure to determine if their condition or urgency has changed. We would like to apologise to patients who have been waiting longer than usual, we are doing all we can to keep our patients, colleagues and visitors safe.”
Across England, there were 139,545 people who had been waiting more a year for treatment at the end of September. That was up from 111,026 in August and just 1,613 in February.
The proportion of people waiting less than the 18-week target time has improved - up from 53.6% in August to 60.6% in September. The target is 92%.
This means the average wait has improved slightly, to 12 weeks - down from nearly 15 weeks in August.
As cases of coronavirus have risen in England, and hospital admissions with them, trusts have once again begun postponing elective treatment.
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