227,000 now wait more than six months for NHS treatment

MORE than 227,000 patients have been forced to wait over six months for planned hospital treatment – up almost a third in a year.

NHS figures show 4.16million remained on waiting lists for operations and other treatment as hospitals struggled to cope over the winter.

In January, 552,219 patients waited longer than the 18-week target for treatment, compared with almost 441,000 12 months earlier.

Of these, 227,569 waited more than six months – a rise of 31 per cent on the same period last year.

Some 36,857 waited more than nine months – an increase of nearly 39 per cent on the same period last year – while 2,157 patients faced agonising waits of more than a year.

Experts said the latest figures suggest hospitals are still struggling to deal with a backlog from last winter, when tens of thousands of operations were cancelled to free up beds.

Professor Derek Alderson, president of the Royal College of Surgeons, said action was needed to tackle the backlog, which ‘continues to grow’.

He said: ‘There are now over 100,000 more patients waiting longer than 18 weeks to start treatment when compared with the same time last year.

‘ While we support NHS England’s plans to pilot new targets and measurements that could improve care, changing targets will not solve the underlying challenges our health service faces.

‘With the worst of winter now hopefully behind us, there is an urgent need for a plan to deal with the increasing backlog of patients on the planned care waiting list and we will work with NHS England to bring this about. Part of this plan must be a commitment to increase hospital bed capacity.’

Most patients were waiting for routine operations such as hip and knee surgery, but the figures also include non- surgical procedures. They exclude cancer treatment.

Latest data shows only 86.7 per cent of patients were seen within 18 weeks, meaning the Government’s 92 per cent target has not been met for three years – since February 2016. Figures also show that last month only 84.2 per cent of patients at A&E departments were treated within the four-hour target, the lowest proportion on record.

The total number of A&E attendances was 1,953,782 last month, compared with 1,820,012 in February last year.

Earlier this week, NHS England announced a review of waiting times, including the four-hour target for casualties.

It is also considering scrapping the 18-week wait for routine operations and the twoweek cancer wait, within which patients with symptoms should be seen by a specialist.

Experts warned that development of the new standards must be driven by doing the best for patients, ensuring that they are treated in a timely manner.

Deborah Ward, of health thinktank The King’s Fund, said: ‘We must not become immune to the reality that behind today’s figures are stories of people with urgent medical needs waiting too long to be treated.’

‘Increasing backlog’