Why the wait for surgery in NSW is the worst it's been in years
Thousands of patients are overdue for time-critical procedures as surgery waiting lists soar to levels not seen since the pandemic, forcing the NSW government to pour another $23 million into the state's hospitals to avoid breaking a post-election promise.
The hospital performance results, released on Wednesday, follow a two-year effort by the Minns government to slash waiting lists and will place further pressure on the state's public hospitals to tackle the problem, after doctors accused hospital administrators of 'buffing the numbers' to meet their publicly reported targets.
There were 100,678 patients waiting for surgery in NSW public hospitals at the end of March, just 346 short of the record peak hit when elective surgeries were paused in the first months of the COVID pandemic (101,024).
Patients needing urgent surgery waited an average of 13 days, while those needing non-urgent surgery could expect to wait 322 days – more than a month longer than the same time last year.
More than 8000 of those patients had waited longer than clinically recommended by their surgeon, including 3000 patients requiring semi-urgent surgery within three months.
Both figures are more than double the number of patients overdue at the same time last year.
Health Minister Ryan Park made cutting the backlog a key priority when he announced a 'surgical care taskforce' in his first day on the job, but said the 'disappointing' figures did not mean he had broken his promise.
'I'm confident that we can turn that around,' he said.
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