Earlier today the Prime Minister announced a new Elective Reform Plan, outlining the Government’s plan to improve delivery of elective care and tackle NHS waiting list backlogs.
Under the plan, the NHS has committed to delivering the milestone laid out in the Government’s Plan for Change of meeting the NHS Constitutional target of treating 92% of patients within 18 weeks by 2029, with the intention of treating 65% of elective patients within 18 weeks by the end of 2026. The NHS also intends to improve performance against the cancer waiting times standards, with further details to be set out in a dedicated national cancer plan.
To meet the elective target, the plan outlines four focus areas for the NHS:
- Empowering patients by giving them more choice and control.
- Reforming delivery by working more productively and consistently to deliver more elective care.
- Delivering care in the right place to ensure patients receive care in the right setting.
- Aligning funding, performance oversight and delivery standards with clear responsibilities and incentives for reform.
Within these four focus areas, the plan outlines several measures to improve the delivery of elective care, which include:
- Transforming diagnostic pathways by extending the opening hours of CDCs, delivering same-day tests and consultations, and expanding the range of tests available, to ensure people are able to access a broad range of appointments closer to home.
- Expanding the use of CDCs will also deliver 500,000 additional appointments annually.
- Creating 14 new surgical hubs within existing hospitals by June and expanding three others to help protect planned care from seasonal and other pressures, with more expected in coming years supported by the £1.5 billion capital investment confirmed in the 2024 Autumn Budget.
- Supporting healthcare providers in using technology to tackle inefficiencies holding up appointments, such as by deploying remote monitoring technology and using AI to reduce missed appointments.
- Enhancing the NHS app to give patients greater choice and control over their treatment.
- Preventing unnecessary referrals by funding GPs to work with hospital doctors to get specialist advice before making referrals.
- Transforming pathways to deliver more activity in the community, starting with the five priority specialties of ENT, gastroenterology, respiratory, urology, and cardiology.
- Implementing innovative ‘collective care’ approaches that prioritise patient convenience such as one-stop clinics and group appointments to improve efficiency.
- Publishing minimum standards for elective care to improve patient experience and identify performance shortfalls.