Increase in waiting times at cavan general a disaster

Cavan-Monaghan TD Brendan Smith has attacked increasing waiting times at Cavan General as a “disaster” for the county.
The Deputy was commenting on the latest figures from independent health body the National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF), who say that almost 400 people joined the out-patient waiting list at Cavan General Hospital since January, upping the waiting list by 36.3%. The NTPF also claims 18% of all patients are waiting more than a year for an appointment.
“The number of people waiting more than a year for an out-patient appointment has risen by 36% since the start of 2015 and is extremely worrying,” said the Fianna Fail foreign spokesman.
“But the spike in out-patient waiting times since May last year has jumped by almost 400%. Over the past year, the number of people waiting more than 12 months for an out-patient appointment has increased by 1,116.
“This government’s decision to strip the NTPF of its main role in driving down hospital waiting lists has proved to be a disaster for Cavan. In the past, the fund purchased spare capacity from the private sector to cut the number of public patients waiting for treatment in public hospitals.”

Additional clinics
A Health Service Executive spokesperson said that the hospital group for the region is committed to fixing the problem “in so far as practically possible”.
“Cavan & Monaghan Hospitals is committed to addressing waiting times for patients and has implemented a number of initiatives including weekend clinics and appointments to ensure waiting times are within acceptable national standards in so far as is practically possible.
Management can confirm that an additional 450 patients will be seen at clinics over the next three weeks,” a spokesperson said.
The former Minister for Children says a task force needs to be set up “to produce a plan to ensure that all scheduled day-case, in-patient care is delivered within the internationally recognised target of six months.
“After four years of false budgets, bogus targets and bad ministerial management it’s clear that this Government’s health policy has been nothing short of disaster for Cavan and Monaghan and we need a new direction for the health service in Ireland that puts patients and services first.
“The fund treated almost 200,000 people with average waiting times being slashed from between two and five years to two to three months. Under Fine Gael and Labour these figures have gone through the roof. Nationally outpatient waiting lists have climbed to over 412,000,” he said.
The figures come at a bad time for the hospital whose maternity unit last week went under independent review after the death of four babies in 2012 - the unit, however, has one of the lowest perinatal mortality rates in the country.