Elective recovery plan

The waiting list for NHS care has reached a new high of 6.1 million. NHS England and NHS Improvement published their delivery plan for elective care recovery in February, which we summarised in a this briefing for trust boards. The plan sets out key targets for how the NHS will recover services and bring down waiting lists over the next three years, including eliminating the longest waits of over two years by July 2022 and waits of over one year by March 2025, as well as aiming for 75% of patients who have been urgently referred by their GP for suspected cancer to have their condition diagnosed (or cancer ruled out) within 28 days by March 2024. Governors may wish to ask how the board is assured that these targets will be met, especially given challenges around capacity and staff shortages.

 

Health inequalities and poorer outcomes for vulnerable groups have worsened during the pandemic. Systems are expected to analyse their waiting list data according to health inequality outcomes and relevant characteristics, including deprivation and ethnicity. Governors may wish to ask how the trust is tackling disparities in waiting times based on ethnicity and deprivation, and how their trust is collaborating with other providers to help reduce variation within and across systems.

 

While this plan focuses on planned hospital ‘elective’ treatment, we know there are also very worrying delays for mental health treatment, and for community services. We continue to call for the NHS to be supported and resourced to address these backlogs too. Governors may wish to ask the non-executive directors how the trust is collaborating with partners to ensure backlogs across all services are being tackled.

 

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