Spot the waiting list initiative: lost without trace in July’s RTT data
The English national waiting list initiative should have got well underway in July. But it didn't: waiting times got worse.
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Waiting times worsen again in Scotland
Scotland's outpatient waiting list is building up quite a backlog. The longer it's left, the harder it will be to fix.
Protecting urgent patients
Protecting urgent patients is easy if you are willing to waste some capacity. But with a little extra care, you can protect urgents and be efficient at the same time.
Royal College of Surgeons calls for more flexibility on urgent patients
The Royal College of Surgeons says urgent patients aren't sufficiently protected by the 18-week and cancer waiting times targets. Their argument is a straw man. But that doesn't mean they are wrong.
English waiting list approaches next danger level
Despite a national breach of the admitted patient target, there is no sign that the current waiting list initiative had much effect on long waiters in June. Also the waiting list is edging closer to the point where even the incomplete pathways target could be at risk.
Jeremy Hunt says “NHS waiting times: job not done”
The current governmental flap over elective waiting times is so fascinating, so contorted, and yet so familiar that it is hard to know where to begin.
Capacity planning for clinical support services
"Oh, didn't we tell you we're doing a waiting list initiative?" Clinical support services, such as radiology, can feel a bit miffed when they are suddenly hit with a surge of work that was planned ages ago but nobody told them about. Fortunately it's easy to build them into your plans.
English waiting list tops 3 million
The English waiting list topped 3 million, and is now the biggest since February 2008, and 20 per cent bigger than at the last General Election. Despite that, long-waits have improved under the Coalition.
18 week waits and the General Election
It's going to be an 18-weeks nail-biter in the run-up to the General Election, especially for the adjusted admitted target.
Meeting your deadline for operational resilience and capacity plans
Your deadline for submitting the new "operational resilience and capacity plans" is the end of July. Here's how to make light work of it.