Thousands suffering hip pain as surgery is ‘rationed’

HUNDREDS of thousands of elderly people are needlessly suffering in pain while they wait for hip operations because care is being rationed by the NHS, leading doctors have warned.

The waiting list for hip, knee and other orthopaedic operations has risen by a quarter over eight years to more than half a million.

One in 10 people has to wait more than 18 weeks for surgery amid rising concern that the NHS is deliberately delaying treatment because their case is not seen as life-threatening.

Those forced to wait for surgery suffer extreme pain as their bones wear away, and are left increasingly immobile, often unable to climb stairs or go outside.

Hospitals were ordered before Christmas not to schedule more major non-urgent operations for a month to avoid a meltdown.

Routine operations were cancelled because regulators said wards were too full and space needed to be made for

emergency patients during the cold snap.

Steve Cannon, of the Royal College of Surgeons, warned that people waiting for hip replacements were being left with little more than painkillers.

He said: “For NHS managers, hip replacements and knee replacements can generally wait because they are not life-threatening. They are easy targets for rationing.

“But they are very painful – they can severely inhibit people’s lifestyles. The longer you wait, the worse the hip becomes, day by day by day. The cartilage gets worn away and the bone becomes exposed. It then slowly wears away.”

According to NHS England, the waiting list for orthopaedic referrals has risen from 376,000 in 2008 to 505,957. More than 60,000 were not treated within the 18-week NHS guarantee.

The figures also suggest that there has been a huge rise in the waiting list for cataract surgery, and that 3.7 million people are now on the waiting list for non-urgent operations.

One in 10 has been on the waiting list for more than 18 weeks.

Dr Sarah Wollaston, Tory chairman of the health select committee, is calling on Theresa May to increase health funding. She said: “Either we spend more or we will see increased waiting lists and all the markers of decline.”

An NHS England spokesman said: “Actually the number of NHS-funded hip and knee operations is rising year on year.”