Cecilia Keaveney (Fianna Fail)

I thank the Cathaoirleach for selecting this matter for discussion on the Adjournment. I also thank him for his forbearance during this session and accommodating many of the important issues I have raised.

I raised this issue, waiting lists in Letterkenny General Hospital and access to the National Treatment Purchase Fund, in the House on 8 May. There appears to be a problem in County Donegal. The statistics show that four out of every ten people waiting for an operation for longer than 12 months are either in Letterkenny, Sligo or Limerick and that six out of every ten are awaiting a procedure in Letterkenny General Hospital, Sligo General Hospital, Temple Street Hospital, Limerick Regional Hospital and Cork University Hospital. Regardless of how one looks at the statistics, Letterkenny is on the hit list for the longest possible waiting times for patients.

When I raised this issue previously, I thought people might not be aware of the National Treatment Purchase Fund, NTPF, and strongly advocated its use. I must declare my interest because a member of my family successfully used the NTPF in recent months. I continue to advocate its use. After three months on a surgical waiting list a person is entitled to either self-refer or have his or her general practitioner or hospital refer him or her to the fund. I was under the impression that patients were not being referred and was blaming the wrong people in some respects. Then I was told people were offered the NTPF but were not prepared to take up the offer. However, I was also told that, in the case of Letterkenny General Hospital, unless one was waiting for more than nine months or one year, one did not qualify for the NTPF. The reason it was doing this was to get rid of the long waiting lists. The reality is that people in my part of the country are being treated differently from people in others. If I am on the waiting list of a hospital for more than three months in another part of the country, I can be referred to the NTPF.

I am seeking clarity on this issue. If there are consultants with particularly long waiting lists and others within the same discipline who do not have long lists, what can the Department do to encourage general practitioners to direct their patients to the consultants with the shorter lists? There should be more discussion between general practitioners, consultants and the HSE about the difficulties. I am aware that meetings take place but my experience is that when I make pronouncements calling on people to use the NTPF and state, from personal experience, that it is wonderful, I will receive a telephone call from somebody who has been told they will have to wait one year for their operation or that their child's urgently needed operation will not be carried out in the foreseeable future.

It is wrong, when so much Government funding is being put into this very good scheme, that people in my constituency are being forced to go private. The need to opt for private care should have been abolished the day the NTPF was established. I am a strong advocate for the NTPF but there should be fair play. If there is an internal war between one side and another with regard to who has these long lists and why they are so long, the patient should not suffer. People in County Donegal are being discriminated against. They do not have the same access to the NTPF as others. That is the basic tenet of my argument.

I am seeking clarity on this issue. I might be wrong and would be happy if people were able to correct me, but the evidence does not indicate it. In recent weeks Letterkenny General Hospital topped the list of hospitals with the longest waiting times. I have told people they can self-refer or ask their general practitioner to send them to a different consultant in an effort to speed up matters but the statistics are clear. I accept they are improving. When I raised this issue previously, there were 2,900 people in the country waiting for longer than 12 months but now the figure is only 1,846. However, if I was one of the 1,846, I would like to know when I would be operated on and would also like to think I would not stop somebody else having an operation.

The NTPF chief executive, Mr. Pat O'Byrne, has been quoted as saying many are waiting needlessly. Why are they waiting needlessly? What can we do to ensure the system is better streamlined? Wherever the blockage is, be it with consultants, hospital administrations or people within the NTPF, it must be removed.