This story was first published in digitalhealth.net
Data shows ‘huge increase’ in cancelled operations
New data obtained by the Labour Party has revealed a huge increase in the number of cancelled hospital operations as a result of staffing issues and equipment failures.
The freedom of information findings highlight that there 78,981 cancelled operations last year, either classed as urgent or were elective operations cancelled at the last minute – either on the day the patient was due to arrive in hospital or after they had already arrived.
Additionally, 10,900 of these operations were cancelled because of staffing issues and 4,800 were cancelled because of equipment failures.
Labour sent FOI requests to all acute hospital trusts in England to ask them to provide the total number of operations cancelled for non-clinical reasons, broken down by the cause of the cancellation. From this, 82 per cent of hospital trusts responded.
Jonathan Ashworth, Labour’s Shadow Health and Social Care Secretary, said: “That so many more people in pain and distress are forced to endure cancelled operations, including increasingly on the day they were supposed to have treatment, is a shameful indictment of a decade of Tory cutbacks running our NHS into the ground.
“The simple truth is under the Tories, patients wait longer and longer for vital care. This general election is about the future of the NHS and ensuring quality care for all. Labour will fully fund our NHS, recruit the doctors and nurses we need and safeguard our NHS from a Trump deal sell off that could cost the NHS £500 million a week.”
There are currently over 100,000 staff vacancies in the NHS, with shortages of 10,000 doctors and 43,000 nurses.
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