HSE winter plan will only cut 36,000 patients from waiting lists

Health minister Stephen Donnelly will be launching a multi-annual waiting list plan later in the year. Picture: Gareth Chaney/Collins Photos

The HSE's winter action plan will see Ireland's 761,000-strong hospital waiting lists reduced by only 36,000 by the end of this year.

The health authority has confirmed it is to offer "150,000 additional appointments, procedures, and/or removals [from waiting lists]" by December. But that will barely cancel out the expected hike in waiting lists if it does not implement the plan.

As of the end of August, there were almost 761,000 patients awaiting in-patient, day-case or out-patient, and GI endoscopy treatment.

The HSE says without action that figure will rise to 875,000. 

However, by offering the following, it believes it can get the total down to 724,000 by the end of December:

• An additional 105,000 new outpatient appointments/waiting list removals;
• An additional 31,000 inpatient or day case procedures/waiting list removals;
• An additional 13,600 GI scopes/waiting-list removals.

The 'waiting list removal' element of the above means validation of the lists, which entails every waiting patient being contacted by letter to ask if they still require care.

That has caused controversy in the past, as patients and their GPs said they were moved off lists incorrectly. Some patients may have paid for private care themselves in the meantime and some may have died.

Patient advocate Stephen McMahon said there should be weekly progress reports on the winter action plan, and it should be clear who is accountable if the target reduction is not met.

Irish Patients Association spokesman Stephen McMahon. Picture: Laura Hutton/Photocall Ireland.

He also said the offers of treatment must first benefit patients who have already been waiting more than 12 months.

It is expected patients will be treated in private hospitals, and Mr McMahon called for the funding to cover their full care package.

He said under previous waiting list initiatives patients had their operations but were then slotted into new public waiting lists for follow-up care.

Among the changes expected from the winter plan are direct access to ENT (ear, nose, and throat) care and virtual trauma assessment clinics. It is also expected a fast-track triage system for physiotherapy will be included.

A new online Health Performance Visualisation platform will be used so staff can see stress points like bed shortages and overcrowded emergency departments.

The initiative is in partnership with the Department of Health and the National Treatment Purchase Fund, which released €100m for this purpose last year.

This effort comes ahead of a multi-annual waiting list plan to be launched later in the year by health minister Stephen Donnelly.

That plan will be overseen by a new taskforce, the minister is setting up as part of a more targeted focus on Sláintecare reforms. He told the Health Committee this week it will be modelled on the vaccine taskforce, as that was so successful.

The need for change was highlighted this week when Dr Clive Kilgallen, chairman of the Irish Medical Organisation’s consultants’ committee, said that more than 290,000 people have been on waiting lists for more than a year.

“We have too few beds, too few health professionals and an ever-increasing demand," he said.

No doctor will be surprised if the waiting list goes beyond a million over the coming months.

The pandemic has not caused the crisis in our healthcare system, but it has deepened it.”