Wales’ Hospital Waiting Lists Reach New Peak

Hospital waiting lists in Wales have continued their upward trend, marking an increase for the eighth consecutive month and establishing a new record. The latest figures from Digital Health and Care Wales indicate that just over 801,300 patient pathways were awaiting treatment. Conversely, the number of the longest waits—those extending to one or two years or more—decreased during the month. Health Secretary Jeremy Miles, who earlier this week announced an additional £22m in funding to address the backlog, expressed his hope that this “positive progress” would persist. However, the Royal College of Surgeons cautioned that an increase in funding would not provide an immediate solution to the backlog. While ambulance response times saw a slight improvement, A&E waiting times, along with outpatient and cancer treatment target times, worsened over the month. In September, there were 23,701 waits of two years or longer, which is 492 fewer than in August and follows five consecutive months of increases. Additionally, 169,262 individuals are waiting a year or more, representing a decrease of 440 from the previous month. Nevertheless, NHS England has significantly outpaced Wales in addressing the most prolonged waits following the Covid pandemic, with only 3.3% of all waits lasting a year or more, compared to 23.3% in Wales. Furthermore, only 113 patients are waiting for over two years across the entirety of England. The longest waiting periods in recent months have been observed in the specialisms of ophthalmology, orthopaedics, and ear, nose, and throat. Due to some patients being on multiple waiting lists, an estimated 618,171 distinct individuals are awaiting treatment—a figure equivalent to the combined populations of Cardiff and Swansea. At the UK Covid inquiry on Wednesday, First Minister Eluned Morgan, who also previously served as health minister, highlighted capacity as an issue, noting that only 172 private hospital beds were available for use across Wales. Miles stated that a total funding package of £50m would contribute to increasing hospital capacity, including the utilization of the private sector. He affirmed, “We recognise the impact long waits for treatment can have on someone’s life, both mentally and physically, so we have a laser-like focus on reducing the longest waits and improving access to patient care.” The Welsh Ambulance Service recorded its second busiest month ever in October for life-threatening emergency calls, with an average of 177 per day. Figures show that 50.4% of crews arrived within eight minutes for these “red” calls, an improvement from the previous month. The average response time was seven minutes 56 seconds. Although the target is still not being met, the service continues to face the challenge of thousands of hours spent outside A&E units awaiting patient handovers. Latest figures indicate approximately 22,000 “lost” hours due to waiting to handover patients at major emergency departments. This situation can result in hundreds of ambulances each month spending four-hour periods outside A&E, rendering them unable to respond to further calls. Other waiting time figures show: Plaid Cymru health spokesman Mabon ap Gwynfor characterized the situation as unsustainable, accusing the Welsh government of “continuing to throw money at the front line without dealing with the root cause”. He asserted that Wales required properly funded and staffed primary care and social care services. The Conservatives stated that the waiting list figures indicated Wales had reached “crisis point”. Health spokesman Sam Rowlands commented that even if Miles’s expectations for his new initiatives were met, they would “barely scratch the surface in terms of tackling these excessive, record-breaking waits for treatment. Something needs to change, fast”. The Royal College of Surgeons described the figures as “dismal reading” and called for an acceleration in the establishment of surgical hubs for operations such as hip and knee replacements and gall bladder removals. Kate Seymour, from the Macmillan cancer charity, stated that the funding announcement represented “another missed opportunity to set out specific plans to reduce cancer waiting times”.