Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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102. To ask the Minister for Health the number of persons treated under the National Treatment Purchase Fund in each of the past ten years and to date in 2025. [63788/25]

Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)
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The Government acknowledges that acute hospital waiting lists are too long, and many patients are waiting an unacceptably long time for care.

We are committed to improving access to hospital care, through reforms and by building sustainable internal capacity within the public system and ensuring that this is maximised to the greatest extent through greater productivity and efficiencies.

Until that capacity is in place to meet the increased demand, we need to utilise all available options to ensure that patients have access to the care they need.

The National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF) is an independent public body funded directly by the Department of Health. One of its main functions is to arrange for the treatment of patients on public hospital waiting lists.

The NTPF uses the hospital waiting list data to identify the longest waiting patients on hospital waiting lists. The suitability of the patients for treatment is determined by the relevant public hospital.

The NTPF commissions treatment through insourcing arrangements with Public Hospitals as governed by a Memo of Understanding and through outsourcing arrangements with Private Hospitals through panel agreements established following competitive tender competitions.

The NTPF has provided the attached table detailing the number of patients accepting offers of NTPF funded treatment from when its commissioning function was re-established in the middle of 2017.

Number of patients accepting offers of NTPF funded treatment