Hospital waiting lists in Wales hit another record high

Official figures for June show 615,341 patients were waiting for 791,511 treatments to take place – both the highest numbers on record.

The estimated number of people waiting for treatment is up by 12% since March 2022.

So-called patient pathways – which account for patients waiting for more than one treatment – have risen by more than 80% since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The number of waits of more than a year was about 160,000 in July and at least two years was 23,400 – 3.5% and 4.3% increases on the previous month, respectively.

Performance in A&E fared a little better but waits remain relatively long historically and services are still some way short of the target of seeing 95% of patients in four hours.

In July, 69.3% of patients in A&Es spent less than four hours in emergency departments from arrival to admission, transfer or discharge – a 0.4% improvement over the month.

Swansea Bay health board saw the biggest proportion spending less than four hours in A&E at 79.1%, with Cardiff and Vale the lowest at 61.7%.

In the latest data, the median average waiting time was two hours, 39 minutes – a six-minute improvement on the previous month.

The Welsh Government also has a target of no patient waiting more than 12 hours but over 10,100 patients waited at least 12 hours, according to the July figures.

Betsi Cadwaldr (3,506) topped the table for 12-hour waits, while Cardiff and Vale was the best performing on this benchmark as well (895).

In July, 48% of life-threatening red calls received a response within eight minutes against a target of 65% – representing a 1.7% increase on the previous month.

Red-call response times have fallen from a peak of 80% in 2017.

However, in that time, there has been a substantial increase in calls, with about 58,000 in the past 12 months – more than twice the number in 2017 (22,000).

In recent years, there has also been a significant problem with handover delays at hospitals, with 20,000 hours lost in July alone.

In total, nearly 35,800 red, amber and green calls were made to the ambulance service in July, an average of 1,154 calls a day.Response times for red calls ranged between four minutes, 30 seconds and six minutes for red calls in the four years before the pandemic.

But the median average response time in July was eight minutes, 18 seconds.

The Welsh Government has a target of 75% of patient pathways starting treatment within 62 days of cancer first being suspected, with a new aim of 80% by 2026.

But, in June, only 56.7% of patient pathways started their first definitive treatment within 62 days though this was an increase of 1.3% on May and 1.9% annually.

Cardiff and Vale health board had the best performance at 64% while the lowest was Cwm Taf Morgannwg’s 52%. Pre-pandemic in December 2020, nearly 67% of patients in Wales were seen within 62 days but no health board has hit the 75% target since July 2020.

Judi Rhys, chief executive of Tenovus Cancer Care, said: “The cancer waiting times figures for June show that we are still not seeing the progress that is so desperately needed.

“As we reach the halfway point of the reporting year, it's clear that despite limited improvement, we remain far from achieving the suspected cancer pathway target.

“Alarmingly, our current position is no better than this time last year or even the year before.”

Mark Drakeford, who served as health minister between 2013 and 2016, returned to the role on an interim basis this month, succeeding Wales’ new first minister Eluned Morgan.

In a press statement responding to the statistics, Prof Drakeford said: “The number of immediately life-threatening red 999 calls to the ambulance service made each day was the fourth highest on record in July.

“And attendances at emergency departments continue to be above the long-term average.

“Performance against the four-hour A&E target improved, and the average time people spent in departments before being discharged, admitted to hospital or transferred also fell in July.

“There was an improvement in ambulance response times and we have also seen an improvement in hospital discharge delay figures in July compared to June.

“However, it is disappointing that the number of people waiting more than two years for treatment has increased and there’s been further growth in the overall waiting list – just as there has been in other parts of the UK.”

Sam Rowlands, the Conservatives’ shadow health secretary, said: “These woeful statistics show the NHS is in crisis as waits have increased to new records for five months in a row.

“The Labour Welsh Government has failed yet again to bear down on these excessive lists.

“Since Eluned Morgan was Labour’s health minister, how can she be trusted to turn this situation around as first minister?

“The Conservatives believe it is past due for Labour to spend every penny they receive for health on the Welsh NHS, as opposed to prioritising the creation of 36 more politicians.”

Mabon ap Gwynfor, his Plaid Cymru counterpart, said: “There is a disappointing inevitability of failing to get to grips with NHS waiting times month after month, and this set of results published today is no different, with waiting times at their highest ever.

"While Labour in Wales has been too focused on internal fighting, the new first minister has left a legacy of at least 615,300 individual patients on treatment waiting lists. She promised to eliminate waiting lists but failed. A damning record for the new first minister of Wales.

“A radical rethink in approach is needed.”

What does the data measure?

It’s important to note the number of “patient pathways” is not the same as the number of patients because some have multiple open pathways for different treatments.

It’s also worth noting that Powys Teaching health board is often an outlier and excluded from some comparisons due to major differences in the number and types of services.

In a blog about the NHS performance data, Stephanie Howarth, the Welsh Government’s chief statistician, outlined some of the key concepts and context.

She stressed the data typically measures the number of times a service is used, not the number of patients who used the service.

Ms Howarth pointed out that the data is not directly comparable with other parts of the UK due to different collection methods and performance targets in each country.

How is the Welsh Government performing?

So far, it’s fair to say performance has been poor.

The Welsh Government set out the following five key milestones in its 2022 recovering plan to tackle the backlog in the aftermath of the pandemic:

no one waiting more than a year for a first outpatient appointment by the end of 2022;

nobody waiting longer than two years in most specialities by March 2023;

eight-week diagnostic target and 14 weeks for therapy services by spring 2024;

no one waiting longer than one year in most specialities by spring 2025; and

cancer diagnosis and treatment within 62 days for 80% of people by 2026.

Welsh ministers have yet not achieved any of the above ambitions, according to the StatsWales data published on August 22.