James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Management of all patients on waiting lists takes place in line with an agreed national policy on waiting list management that issued in 2013. This policy was developed to ensure all administrative, managerial and clinical staff would follow an agreed national minimum standard for the management and administration of waiting lists for scheduled care. The policy describes the process for assigning priority to patients and all patients, with every person added to the waiting list assigned a priority category of either "routine" or "urgent". Several factors determine prioritisation of the clinical urgency of a patient and his or her subsequent scheduling, including pain levels. The decision on prioritisation is a clinical one, taken by a doctor, as is proper.

In addition to the national waiting list management policy, a toolkit to support the successful implementation of the new policy has been developed. The performance improvement toolkit for scheduled care focuses on the organisational, procedural and operational changes necessary to improve patient experience of scheduled care. It provides an organisational assessment tool to enable hospitals to understand their current capabilities and performance. It also identifies areas for hospitals to focus on improvements based on the organisational assessment.

With the assistance and support of the special delivery unit, SDU, and the National Treatment Purchase Fund, NTPF, 90% of adult patients were waiting less than eight months at the end of April, with 10% waiting for longer than the eight month target. That 10% comprises 4,462 patients, which compares favourably with the 5,302 adult patients who had been waiting for longer than eight months in April 2013. Even more significant improvements are evident in outpatient waiting lists, which indicate that 93% of outpatients had been seen within 52 weeks by the end of April, whereas only 73% of outpatients had been seen within 52 weeks in April 2013.

Should any patient consider that his or her clinical condition and-or pain levels are disimproving, it is recommended that he or she bring this to the attention of a GP who can bring it to the attention of the consultant, with a request that the level of priority of the patient be reconsidered.

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