Primary care waiting lists up to 44% longer, HSE admits

Primary care therapy waiting lists have risen by up to 44% since 2023, senior HSE official tells Oireachtas committee. Stock Image.

Waiting lists for primary care therapies are “simply too long”, a senior HSE official admitted on Thursday, saying some have increased by 44% since June 2023.

Pat Healy, the national director for National Services & Schemes, said that despite the “good care” delivered every day, waiting lists and waiting times continue to grow.

Waiting lists between June 2023 and October last year for speech and language therapy, occupational therapy and physiotherapy all “increased significantly”, he told the Oireachtas Disability Committee.

The increases ranged “from 30% to 44%”, he said.

Overall, across the community healthcare networks, he described an overall 22% increase over that period.

However, he highlighted reduced waiting times for dietetics and podiatry.

He said that across the system: “there remain many challenges for people both children and adults and their families that care for them.” 

Part of the HSE’s response has been a waiting list initiative for physiotherapy, occupational therapy (OT) and speech and language therapy (SLT).

These three specialties were previously seeing 2,400 new additions to waiting lists each month, but he said numbers have now fallen “by almost 14,000, the first significant reduction nationally in four years”.

The committee also heard about the impact of staff shortages on children and adults on waiting lists.

Social Democrats TD Liam Quaid said the HSE hiring policy, including its pay and workforce strategy, has meant “the truth is” recruitment has been hampered.

He indicated that the HSE is relying on agency staff instead of direct recruitment.

Mr Healy said “we don’t have enough today, physios, OTs and speech & language therapists.” 

He explained that the waiting list plan aims to ensure no one waits longer than 39 weeks.

But he said: “if we want to maintain it at that level, we need additional staff.

“We reckon we need 500 staff to maintain it at that level, and this year we’ve approval for 200 additional staff.” He insisted: “we are trying to employ as many therapists as we possibly can.” 

Labour Senator Laura Harmon raised questions about psychology waiting lists in Cork, saying the South Lee area in particular was identified as “a black spot” in 2024.

Mr Healy said a “huge amount of work” is under way to address psychology waiting lists nationally.

“And in Cork, so Cork has had a challenge in relation to psychology for a long time,” he said. “When I was there as a regional director, we had the problem then as well. There was a difficulty in getting people to take up roles there.” 

He said this was partly because services had not been well developed over time, adding: “we’re starting to do that now.”

Nationally, he said psychology referrals are “going up very significantly”, noting a 62% increase since 2017.

“We’ve increased the number of psychologists by 110, which is significant, so over a third from what it was in 2023,” he said.

However, he acknowledged ongoing retention issues, including difficulties keeping staff in Cork-based roles.