Operations and other routine care are ahead of ambitions set out
in April with mental health services back at pre-pandemic levels,
NHS figures show today.
The number of people waiting over 52 weeks to begin treatment
dropped by more than 50,000 in April, while by May, operations
and other elective activity had already climbed to 90% of
pre-pandemic levels, well ahead of the 75% threshold set out in
official guidance.
Hardworking staff have continued to recover services disrupted
during the pandemic, with 1.1m people beginning treatment and
1.8m diagnostic tests taking place in April, all against the
backdrop of having cared for 400,000 seriously ill covid patients
in hospital since the pandemic began.
In addition, the NHS has administered more than 58 million covid
vaccines in just six months.
New data show cancer services have continued to rebound strongly,
with more than 200,000 people referred for cancer checks in April
following a record high the month before.
The NHS also faced one of its busiest months on record in terms
of emergency care in May, with staff responding to more than
800,000 incidents – an increase of over 70,000 from two years
previously.
In addition to increased demand, staff in emergency departments
are having to work differently from how they did pre-pandemic,
with extra time needed for applying PPE and performing rapid
covid tests on patients.
Social distancing and enhanced infection prevention control
measures have also meant fewer beds and less clinical space.
Professor Stephen Powis, national medical director for
NHS England, said:
"Despite the extensive disruption to care caused by the pandemic,
it's encouraging that today's figures show routine operations,
cancer and mental health care have now all rebounded sharply.
Average waits for non-urgent care have fallen to 11 weeks, and
the number of people waiting over 52 weeks fell by more than
50,000 in April. Mental health services are back at pre-pandemic
levels, and treatment rates for cancer are also now back to usual
levels, with nearly nineteen out of twenty people starting
treatment for the disease within one month."
The NHS is committed to restoring services to pre-pandemic levels
and has recently invested £1bn in elective recovery.
The elective accelerator programme was announced last month and
will see a dozen trusts and five specialist children’s hospitals
receive a share of £160 million increase the number of elective
operations they deliver.
The sites are being supported to implement and evaluate new and
innovative ways of working to get activity levels back on track.
Treatment rates for cancer are back to usual levels with nearly
25,000 people starting treatment in April (24,963) – an increase
of more than 4,000 since the same time period last year (20,574),
and more than nine in ten people started treatment for the
disease within one month (94.2%).
As recommended by the cancer task force, the NHS is also
publishing a faster diagnosis standard for cancer for the first
time, so that people can get the all clear or a definitive
diagnosis within one month. This is part of the NHS Long Term
Plan’s ambitions to catch more cancers at an earlier stage, when
they are easier to treat.
With the pandemic taking a toll on the country’s mental health,
important steps have been made in restoring services to pre-covid
levels and there has been an increase in the number of patients
referred for talking therapies for common disorders such as
depression and anxiety.
Newly published data on mental health services show that IAPT
referrals significantly increased to 159,140 in March 2021, a
rise from 133,365 in February and from 108,330 the year before.
Waiting times standards have continued to exceed targets and
recovery rates have achieved an annual high, remaining above the
50% standard.
The number of diagnostic tests, which include CT scans and
biopsies, rose to 1,847,500 in April this year, an increase of
202% since April 2020.
The median wait for routine operations has fallen to 11 weeks,
down from 11.6 weeks in March and from a high of 19.6 weeks last
July.
Waits for diagnostic tests also fell, with the median now
standing at 2.7 weeks, down by three-quarters after the initial
impact of the pandemic in May last year.
Background
- At the end of May, the NHS had cared in hospital for 400,446
seriously ill patients with Covid-19 since the pandemic began.
- Patients waiting more than 52 weeks to begin treatment
dropped to 385,490 - down 50,637 from 436,127 in March, a
decrease of 11.6%.
