A scheme dispatching expert medical teams to hospitals in areas with high levels of unemployment is dramatically cutting NHS waiting lists, the Health Secretary says.
The initiative, launched in September, targets 20 areas where a significant portion of the population is not in work due to ill health, among other factors.
Wes Streeting says these targeted efforts are proving twice as effective at reducing waiting lists when compared to national averages.
“By sending top doctors to provide targeted support to hospitals in the areas of highest economic inactivity, we are getting sick Brits back to health and back to work,” Mr Streeting stated.
He highlighted data from October to January showing a significantly faster reduction in waiting lists within the targeted areas compared to the rest of the country.
The scheme, according to the Health Secretary, has accelerated the decline in waiting times by 130 per cent.
That translates to approximately 37,000 patients removed from waiting lists across the 20 targeted areas, averaging nearly 2,000 per hospital trust.
The Health Secretary added: “The investment and reform this Government has introduced has already cut NHS waiting lists by 193,000, but there is much more to do.
“I am determined to transform health and social care so it works better for patients – but also because I know that transformation can help drag our economy out of the sluggish productivity and poor growth of recent years.
“We have to get more out of the NHS for what we put in. By taking the best of the NHS to the rest of the NHS, reforming the way surgeries are running, we are cutting waiting lists twice as fast at no extra cost to the taxpayer.
“As we boost NHS productivity and deliver fundamental reform through our plan for change, you will see improvements across the service in the coming weeks and months.”
Mr Streeting gave examples of places where the scheme has worked, including Warrington & Halton, which has run gynaecology clinics at weekends, with one-stop models reducing the need for follow-up appointments.
East Lancs Hospitals Trust focused on streamlining diagnostic pathways and increasing capacity for echocardiography, or heart scans.
The waiting lists for those procedures was reduced from about 2,700 patients to about 700, with all patients having their scan within six weeks.
Data shows the number of people unable to work due to sickness is at its highest since the 1990s.
The number of adults economically inactive due to ill health rose from 2.1 million in July 2019 to a peak of 2.9 million in October 2023.
Following the success of the programme, the Government has confirmed similar crack teams will be rolled out further this year.
The new data comes after the Prime Minister announced the abolition of NHS England, dubbed the “world’s largest quango”, this week.
The move was intended to “cut bureaucracy” and bring the management of the health service “back into democratic control”, Sir Keir Starmer said.
