Fife patients are experiencing waits of two years or more for orthopaedic surgery – with referrals from NHS Lothian blamed.
It had been hoped the new national treatment centre in Kirkcaldy would help tackle waiting lists, but official board papers suggest it may be making things worse.
Opening the £33 million facility in March 2023, Nicola Sturgeon said it would give people across Scotland “faster access to life-changing” surgery.
She claimed: “The additional capacity provided through this new state-of-the-art facility will also help cut the backlog of planned care worsened by the global pandemic.”
But after more than a year, data released by NHS Fife in its March board report shows huge numbers of patients are still experiencing significant delays.
The reports says 32 patients in Fife have been waiting over 104 weeks, despite Scots having a legal right to treatment within three months.
Just 37.5% of patients received treatment within this time frame, with 300 orthopaedic surgery patients waiting more than 52 weeks.
The report says: “The increase in patients waiting over 104 weeks in orthopaedics is due to referrals received from another health board for treatment in the national treatment centre (NTC).”
The Courier can reveal the majority of these referrals have been received from NHS Lothian.
Graeme Downie, Scottish Labour candidate for Dunfermline and Dollar, said it was “perverse” if the NTC was actually doing the opposite of what was intended.
He said: “National Treatment Centres are supposed to help address national waiting times in key areas but not only are NHS times rising across the country, it seems the orthopaedic centre in Fife has actually increased waiting times for people in the Kingdom.”
Claire Dobson, NHS Fife’s director of acute services, said the vast majority of patients at the centre are resident in the Kingdom.
“Whilst we have treated a number of patients from the NHS Lothian Board area, there has been no reduction in theatre capacity for Fife patients since the NTC opened in March 2023,” she added.
“The most recently published figures from Public Health Scotland show that around 2,700 patients in Fife are awaiting orthopaedic procedures, with less than 20 having waited in excess of 104 weeks. That does not mean that we are accepting of waits of this length, and we are continually working to increase theatre capacity in order to minimise waiting times wherever possible.”
The Scottish Government said it is committed to eradicating long waits, made worse by the Covid pandemic.
Two centres are open and two more will be ready for patients this year, allowing capacity for more than 20,000 extra procedures.
“NTCs are designed to be used by patients from across the country, not just those in the board they are situated in,” the government added.
“NTC Fife is therefore not a resource solely for Fife patients but a resource for patients throughout Scotland. Allocation to NTC Fife is undertaken by the Scottish Government and is done on a long waits basis to ensure equity across Scotland.”
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