This item was published during the term of a previous administration that ended in April 2007
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Waiting times targets met
23/02/2006
The national maximum waiting times targets of six months have been met, it was announced today.
Health Minister Andy Kerr said the reduction in maximum waits for inpatients and day cases, and for outpatients, by December 31, 2005, was a tremendous achievement by the NHS and excellent news for patients across Scotland.
Speaking ahead of a Parliamentary debate, Mr Kerr said:
"NHSScotland has delivered. Everyone in the service has worked enormously hard to bring about these improvements for patients.
"This is the best performance ever recorded for inpatient and day case waiting. The best performance ever recorded for outpatient waiting. The guarantees and targets for heart treatment have again been met. And there have been significant reductions made in waiting lists.
"It's worth remembering where we came from. In recent years, patients have benefited from cuts in maximum waiting times from 12 months to nine months, and now down to six. At the end of 2004, there were 6,000 inpatients and day cases and more than 45,000 outpatients waiting longer than six months.
"These achievements have not occurred in isolation. They have been delivered through change and reform. New ways of working have brought greater capacity and flexibility in the NHS. This performance could not have been achieved without a collaborative and whole systems approach; an approach that harnesses all parts of the NHS to work together. The result is better, faster services for patients.
"Investment in the NHS has supported this change agenda. The introduction of 600 one-stop clinics where patients now visit only once for consultation are an prime example of a new and more productive NHS.
"Meeting the six month target is not an endpoint but a springboard for the next challenge - the NHS is already working on meeting the 18 week maximum target for the end of 2007."
Speaking about Availability Status Codes (ASCs) - which have declined from the previous quarter but increased compared to December 31, 2004, the Minister said:
"There is a great deal of misinformation about ASCs. Information on numbers is published regularly on the Acute Hospital Care website - nothing is hidden away - and patients with ASCs are included in the waiting lists count.
"Codes are applied by hospitals in line with national guidance. The vast majority of patients - nine out of 10 - have a Code applied because they have asked to delay admission for personal reasons; because they did not attend an arranged appointment; or because they have an underlying medical condition which affects their ability to undergo treatment.
"However, we gave a commitment just over a year ago that ASCs will be abolished completely by 2007 to make the whole system more transparent, consistent and fairer to patients. All NHS Boards have produced plans showing how they will phase them out."
Performance figures for NHS Boards show that on December 31, 2005, only two patients in Scotland with a guarantee had waited more than six months for inpatient/day case treatment (in NHS Ayrshire and Arran) and only two patients had waited more six months for a first outpatient appointment (in NHS Greater Glasgow and NHS Lothian). The extremely small number of breaches were due to administrative errors. In each case, the patient was seen quickly as soon as the error came to light.
The figures also show that NHS Scotland achieved the maximum wait target of eight weeks for heart treatment investigation (angiography) and 18 weeks for heart treatment (angioplasty / Coronary Artery Bypass Graft).