05 December 2003
Health service managers have been encouraged by a report that describes impressive levels of progress within the NHS since the launch of the national plan more than three years ago.
NHS chief executive Sir Nigel Crisp's annual report, published on December 3, claimed that the service was well placed to meet ambitious waiting time targets of a maximum six-month wait for admission and a 13-week wait for an outpatient appointment by 2005.
According to the report, day case surgery increased by 14.9%, while the number of people waiting more than six months for an operation fell by 28.5% and those waiting more than 13 weeks for an outpatient appointment decreased by 38%.
It also indicated that more treatment was taking place outside hospital and greater use was being made of NHS Direct, walk-in centres and day surgery.
Gill Morgan, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, said: 'This report shows that it is time to move away from outdated judgements on NHS performance based solely on hospital activity as increasingly treatment is taking place in the community.
'We need to construct a more rounded assessment of how the NHS is performing.'
Crisp agreed that a sole focus on acute hospital admissions gave a misleading picture of value for money within the NHS, although he acknowledged that primary care-based activity was more difficult to calculate.
He said he expected the improvement to be sustained as capacity increased. 'We are making progress but we are still only three years into a ten-year programme of change. We still have a great deal to do,' he said.
Health Secretary John Reid praised the dedication of NHS staff. But he refused to hail the findings as justification for the target culture. 'Targets are the distillation of the quality of improved treatment. When we see more people are being seen more quickly than ever before, it's a vindication of hard work,' he said.
But the health think-tank the King's Find cast doubts on the robustness of the figures. A spokesman said: 'Any reduction in waiting times is obviously a good thing. But this has largely been achieved by compressing down waiting lists, and shunting other patients to the back of the queue.'
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