The NHS hidden waiting lists not showing up in official figures

A new investigation has revealed that patients in England are facing delays stuck on hidden waiting lists that do not show up in the official figures.

The published waiting list currently stands at 7.6 million, but the true scale of the backlog is believed to be much higher, because patients needing ongoing care are not automatically included in those figures, even if they face major delays.

NHS England have said hospitals should be counting and monitoring such cases, but new evidence suggests that this is not always the case.

Hospitals are meant to return patients facing unnecessary delays to the waiting list to ensure they are counted in the backlog figures, but of 30 NHS trusts asked how regularly this was happening, only three could provide figures.

Karen Hyde from Insource, a company that helps hospitals manage waiting lists, said the guidance was “commonly ignored”.

She went on to say “This is a huge issue.  The NHS does not incentivise hospitals to keep a close eye on these patients.  We know there are long waits for those on the waiting list.  For those not on the official waiting list, it is likely to be even worse, but the figures are not published.”

She added that another problem was that some patients face being removed from the waiting list before their treatment starts – this can be done when the patient is not ready for treatment or if they have refused it.  But she said many hospitals had no reliable systems for tracking these patients, who could be simply “lost and delayed”.

An NHS England spokesperson said “National guidance is clear that if a regular follow-up review or treatment becomes overdue and a patient is waiting longer than the time agreed with their clinician, they should be added back on to the waiting list and therefore would be included in the published figures.”

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Posted by Karen Motley, Clinical Negligence Department, Chadwick Lawrence LLP (jacquelinevance@chadlaw.co.uk), medical negligence lawyers and clinical negligence solicitors in Huddersfield, Leeds, Wakefield and Halifax, West Yorkshire.

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