§ Mr. RedmondTo ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will list the average waiting times for the following operations at each of the hospitals in the Trent regional health authority(a) hip replacements, (b) knee replacements, (c) hernias, (d) cataracts, (e) ear, nose and throat, (f) varicose veins, and (g) gynaecological; if he will show in his answer comparative figures for five and 10 years ago; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. MellorWe do not collect waiting time information centrally for individual hospitals. The hon. Member may wish to contact the chairman of the Trent regional health authority, who may be able to provide this information.
§ Mr. KnoxTo ask the Secretary of State for Health whether the waiting list statistics for September 1988 are yet available; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. MellorI have today published a statistical bulletin giving details of numbers of in-patients and day cases on the NHS hospital waiting lists for the six months which ended on 30 September 1988.
On a comparable basis with earlier figures, there were 691,100 patients on the in-patient waiting lits for England at 30 September last year. This is a slight increase on the figure for March 1988, although it is still more than 8 per cent. lower than in March 1979.
During the six months in question 941,400 in-patients and 359,200 day cases were treated from the waiting lists. For in-patients and day cases treated, the median waiting time was estimated to be around five weeks—a period which we have managed to sustain since March last year, in spite of the fact that the NHS is now treating more patients than ever before.