Eighty-year-old Francie McGovern is just one of 226 people on a waiting list for cataract operations in Sligo General Hospital. It is over a year since he was seen by a doctor at the hospital and told that he would be operated on. He first went to an optician about the problem five years ago.
A retired farmer from Ballinamore in Co Leitrim, he hasn't been able to drive a car for some years. He describes his condition as a mist coming over his eye and, as he talks, he has to wipe it with a handkerchief.
He has no idea when he'll be called for the operation, but says that when a query was made on his behalf in February, the response was that there was an 11month waiting list.
His wife, Lena, has had an equally bad experience of the health services, as she has been on a waiting list for a knee replacement operation at Tallaght Hospital for over a year.
She believes they are being left waiting because they are medical-card holders. "It would be different if you had VHI. I was told that I was on the `urgent' list and that I'd be called in four or five months, but that would have been March or April. You get to the stage where you give up on them." Lena has had trouble with her knee since she fell off a bike when she was aged 10. Her condition has deteriorated in recent years and she has to take pain killers regularly. "At times I can't sleep at night and now my leg is gone all crooked." The McGoverns are fairly typical of the people behind hospital waiting list statistics. Lena isn't really regarded as urgent enough to be called within a year. But their quality of life would be improved dramatically if they could be operated upon now rather than in another 12 months.
Sligo General Hospital, along with its sister hospital in the North Western Health Board area, Letterkenny General Hospital, has actually been rewarded for its record in reducing waiting lists in the first half of this year.
In August both hospitals received additional funding from the Minister of Health as an incentive towards further reducing the numbers waiting.
Such announcements mean little to people like the McGoverns, however. It appears that no matter what the State's Budget surplus is, there will always be long waiting lists for public patients.
It has also been pointed out by the Fine Gael TD for Sligo/ Leitrim, Mr Gerry Reynolds, that the numbers waiting for operations at Sligo and Letterkenny hospitals have risen since 1997. The most recent figures from the Department of Health show that in June there were 1,251 people on waiting lists at Sligo and 640 at Letterkenny, compared to 1,047 and 597 respectively in June 1997.
Mr Reynolds said it was clear the health board needed more money from the Department if the waiting lists were to be reduced, and that the recent allocation would not be enough.
"There are still people on the waiting list for more than two years. I know GPs who are now trying to get patients into Dublin hospitals because they feel it would be quicker," he said.
The North Western Health Board says that its commitment to reducing waiting lists has been proven by the allocations both hospitals received from Mr Cowen in August. A total of u£3 million was allocated to the 14 hospitals in the State which were the "best performers" at reducing their waiting lists.
One-sixth of this allocation went to the NWHB, with Sligo General getting £200,000 and Letterkenny receiving £300,000. Prior to this the NWHB had received an allocation of £863,000 for 1999 under the Department's Waiting List Initiative.
Significant improvements were made at both hospitals in the first six months of the year - last December there were 1,780 people on waiting lists in Sligo and 805 at Letterkenny. In making these reductions, however, both hospitals were only making up some of the ground lost in 1997-98.
Adults in need of ear, nose and throat procedures make up the largest group on the waiting lists at Sligo, accounting for 539 of the 1,251 total, while the next biggest group is the 226 people awaiting cataract operations.
In a statement the NWHB said the latest £200,000 allocation meant that Sligo General would be able to provide services for an additional 200 patients by the end of the year.
"It is anticipated that the decreasing trend in waiting lists can be maintained. However, this is contingent on a number of factors, not least among them the levels of emergency medical admissions that may rise as winter approaches," the statement said.
Meanwhile, Lena finds it hard to be optimistic and is afraid the threatened nurses' strike could cause further delays. She just hopes that something will be done soon for Francie.