‘Unlikely’ that NHS will meet 18-week waiting time target, say trust leaders

LONDON: The Government will not meet its ambition of getting NHS waiting times down to 18 weeks without investing in more capacity for primary care, children’s services and mental health, according to trust leaders.

They also warned there is a “fundamental mismatch” between demand for services and what the NHS is able to do.The NHS Providers’ annual State of the Provider Sector survey – which included responses from 171 leaders across 118 trusts – found almost all (96 per cent) are concerned about the forthcoming winter. The top three biggest issues are the delayed discharge of patients from hospital beds once fit to leave, social care capacity, and the number of beds. It comes after the Labour Government outlined its ambition to ensure 92 per cent of patients receive care within 18 weeks within the next five years. To meet the target, it has pledged to deliver an extra two million NHS appointments a year.

Currently, the waiting list stands at 7.6 million, with the latest figures showing some 282,664 people in England had been waiting more than a year to start routine hospital treatment at the end of August.

The poll found almost three-quarters of trust leaders (71 per cent), and all bosses from acute specialist and ambulance trusts, think it is unlikely or very unlikely that the NHS can meet 18 weeks over the next five years.

The NHS target, which calls for 92 per cent of patients to start their treatment within 18 weeks, was last hit in February 2016. The boss of one NHS trust said: “The Government have got the most focus on getting back to 18 weeks, which is the hardest standard to meet of all.

“If you think, there were seven million people on a waiting list, and as fast as you take them off, currently, we’re putting more people on. “So that is a huge numbers game that’s going to cost a huge amount of money, unless you can do something to arrest the increase of people going on to waiting lists. “If you don’t create the capacity in primary care, in children’s services, in mental health, you can’t do the management of people properly in the community and stop them getting so acutely unwell.”