A quarter of the patients waiting for surgery at six Dublin hospitals have been waiting for more than a year for their operations, according to new figures.
The figures, published by the National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF) yesterday, show there are 4,913 patients "actively" waiting for surgery at Tallaght, Beaumont, the Mater, St James's, St Vincent's and Blanchardstown hospitals. Some 1,207 of them have been waiting for more than 12 months.
The NTPF claims that while there are a further 1,450 patients waiting for surgery at these hospitals, they are not "actively" waiting. Some 544 patients have been "suspended" from the active waiting list because they are not ready for surgery for clinical, social or personal reasons, and 906 are not included because they have already been given appointments to have their surgery within the next three months.
The figures also indicate that another 2,103 patients are waiting for medical treatment at the seven hospitals. Of these 827 have been waiting over 12 months.
These include 151 patients who are described as waiting for "pain relief" procedures for more than a year at Beaumont Hospital and 123 patients waiting for "pain relief" procedures for more than a year at St Vincent's hospital.
The new statistics are the first waiting-list figures to be published since May 2004 and they cover only seven hospitals - the six Dublin ones already mentioned and St John's Hospital in Limerick, which has 31 patients actively waiting for surgery.
Waiting-list data is now being collated from all other hospitals across the State and will be published on line on the NTPF's website as it becomes available. Waiting times for surgical procedures at Galway's University College Hospital, for example, will be available shortly and up-to- date waiting times for surgery in all hospitals is due online before the end of next year.
NTPF chairwoman Maureen Lynott said the seven hospitals for which data has been published traditionally accounted for approximately 40 per cent of the number of patients waiting for surgery across the State. If this is so, it suggests that the number of patients "actively" waiting for surgery across the State is now less than 10,000.
Minister for Health Mary Harney insisted that the data showed progress was being made on waiting times for surgery even if targets set in the National Health Strategy published in 2001 have not been met.
The strategy promised that no patient would have to wait more than three months for treatment by the end of 2004.
Ms Harney said there were 39,000 patients on hospital waiting lists seven years ago, that this was down to 27,000 in 2001 and down to about 19,000 at the end of 2003.
"By any standard we have made enormous progress," she said.
Donal Duffy, assistant secretary general of the Irish Hospital Consultants' Association, said the figures had to be viewed in the context of the promises made in the 2001 health strategy.
"Comparison with earlier waiting list statistics is meaningless because the methodology used by the NTPF to collect data is different from that used previously," he said.