Government waiting list action plan ‘falls at first hurdle’, says IHCA

• 896,600 people on some form of public hospital waiting list; over 99,000 of these are children;
• 12,800 people added to three main waiting lists in the first two months of 2022, missing Government reduction target by 34,800, despite new waiting list action plan;  
• Latest €350m plan launched just two weeks ago unlikely to meet target of reducing waiting lists by 132,000 (18%) by end of 2022;  
• Urgent action needed to address public hospital capacity deficits and Consultant vacancies, say Consultants.

IHCA President Prof Alan Irvine: “The 2022 Waiting List Action Plan published by the Department of Health just two weeks ago has fallen at the first hurdle. The NTPF figures released today confirm our fears that these waiting lists may take a decade or more to get under control without simultaneously resolving the Consultant recruitment and retention crisis in our public hospitals and filling the one in five Consultant posts vacant or filled on a temporary basis.”

The Irish Hospital Consultants Association (IHCA) has today (Friday 11 March 2022) warned that the Government’s Waiting List Action Plan launched just two weeks ago has fallen at the first hurdle, with the latest figures from the National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF) showing increases rather than reductions in the number of people waiting for care.

The €350 million plan set out a target to reduce waiting lists for outpatient appointments, inpatient and day case treatment, and GI (gastrointestinal) endoscopies by more than 132,000 (18%) by the end of the year compared with the number waiting at the start of 2022.*

However, two months into 2022 and instead of an expected reduction of around 22,000 people, the latest NTPF figures released today confirm that 12,800 additional people have in fact been added to these three main waiting lists since the start of the year - a 34,800 shortfall.** 

The IHCA says that outpatient appointments have seen the biggest increases in the number of people waiting – a further 9,200 people added to the list, instead of the pro rata target reduction of 21,600 people by the end of February. 

Consultants have raised concerns that outpatient waiting lists will need to decrease by an average of 13,900 per month between now and the end of 2022 if the overall Waiting List Action Plan target of reducing the number awaiting an outpatient appointment to 487,000 is to be achieved. 

The warning from Consultants over the Government and HSE’s unrealistic waiting list targets comes as NTPF figures confirm there are 896,631 people on some form of hospital waiting list, including 99,190 children. This is an increase of 19,600 (2%) in the past year, or around 54 people added to public hospital waiting lists every single day since the end of February 2021.

More than 118,600 people have been added to NTPF waiting lists since the start of the pandemic two years ago - an increase of 15%. Outpatient waiting lists alone have increased by 68,000 (12%) since 2020, with the number of those waiting to be assessed by a Consultant almost doubling to 626,658 in the past eight years – a 94% (+303,000) increase. 

As talks on Consultant contracts continue to stall in the absence of a new Independent Chair, the IHCA has today renewed its call on Government to effectively address the record hospital waiting lists by ending the pay discrimination introduced in 2012 against Consultants contracted after that date. Consultants say this is a critical step towards re-establishing trust and making Ireland a more competitive market for highly skilled medical and surgical specialists. 

Commenting on today’s NTPF figures, IHCA President Professor Alan Irvine, said:

“The 2022 Waiting List Action Plan published by the Department of Health just two weeks ago has fallen at the first hurdle. The NTPF figures released today confirm our fears that these waiting lists may take a decade or more to get under control without simultaneously resolving the Consultant recruitment and retention crisis in our public hospitals and filling the one in five Consultant posts vacant or filled on a temporary basis. 

“Unfortunately, not one of the 45 actions listed in the Government’s Waiting List Plan will address the fundamental issue of the overwhelming shortage of Consultants, acute hospital beds, theatre and other frontline resources.

“Official health policy now provides for patient wait times of up to a year for a procedure and 18 months for initial outpatient assessment. These waiting times for essential medical and surgical care are the worst in Europe and are a far cry from the maximum waiting time guarantees in Sláintecare, which pledged to ensure no-one would wait more than 12 weeks for an inpatient procedure, 10 weeks for an outpatient appointment and 10 days for a diagnostic test.

“Hospital Consultants are concerned that the Waiting List Plan and the HSE National Service Plan 2022 are built on fundamentally flawed foundations. 

“Neither of the plans commit to a specific target for the number of additional hospital Consultants to be appointed and in-post during 2022 or beyond. Nor has there been any engagement or follow through on commitments made towards solving the core issues around Consultant contracts and ending the pay discrimination introduced in 2012 against Consultants contracted after that date. There is also a real risk that the pent-up demand for care that has built up during the pandemic and which will present during 2022 has been significantly underestimated. 

“Solutions cannot emerge from a vacuum or by skirting around the clear and sustainable actions. This approach over the last decade has severely undermined trust and is driving our highly trained medical and surgical specialists abroad, leaving our patients without access to the care they need and deserve.”

ENDS 
Notes to editors: 
* 2022 Waiting List Action Plan: https://assets.gov.ie/216946/7d2067d1-5b81-4061-8371-ad2e908f7bac.pdf
** Analysis based on latest NTFP data as at 24 February 2022: https://www.ntpf.ie/home/nwld.htm

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