Hospital waiting times not the worst

3:54pm Wednesday 22nd August 2001

I am writing to express my concern regarding the recent article Where the wait is ENTless (News Shopper, August 1).

You state “waiting times for ENT treatment in Lewisham are the worst in London”.

This is misleading.

The National Audit Office (NAO) report which reviewed Inpatient and Outpatient waiting in the NHS looked at health authorities and not individual trusts.

The Lewisham Hospital NHS Trust is part of the Lambeth, Southwark and Lewisham Health Authority, which also includes King's Healthcare NHS Trust and Guy's and St Thomas' Hospital NHS Trust.

The NAO report, therefore, refers to waiting in all three trusts. The article confuses the difference between waiting for inpatient treatment and outpatient appointments. The NHS Executive London Regional target is that by the end of this financial year no patient will wait more than 15 months for inpatient treatment, not six months as stated in the article.

The target for patients waiting for their first outpatient appointment is no one will wait more than six months.

We do not only treat ENT patients from the Lambeth, Southwark and Lewisham Health Authority area. Due to our location, we also see patients from Greenwich and Bexley, in fact, more than from Lambeth, Southwark and Lewisham.

Michael Scott

Chief Executive

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