(2) what progress has been made in meeting the 18 week hospital treatment target for patients in the Barnet primary care trust area; and if he will make a statement.
The information requested is not held centrally. However, referral to treatment (RTT) times for admitted pathways (RTT times for patients whose 18 week clock stopped during the month with an inpatient/day case admission), and for non-admitted pathways (RTT times for patients whose 18 week clock stopped during the month for reasons other than an inpatient/day case admission) in the Barnet primary care trust area from January 2007 to October 2007 can be found in the following table.
By December 2008, no one should have to wait more than 18 weeks from the time they are referred by their general practitioner (GP) to the start of their treatment unless it is clinically appropriate to do so or they choose to wait.
The national health service began measuring waits for GP referral to start of consultant led treatment from January 2007. This allows the Department and the NHS to monitor and track progress towards the maximum 18 week wait.
RTT data published on 10 January 2008 show that in October 2007, 60 per cent. of admitted patients waited no more than 18 weeks for their treatment following the initial referral by their GP—an improvement on snapshot figures released in December 2006, which showed that 35 per cent. of patients received treatment within 18 weeks. The figure for non-admitted patients for October was 77 per cent.
January 2007 February 2007 March 2007 April 2007 May 2007 June 2007 July 2007 August 2007 September 2007 October 2007 Admitted pathways Percentage of pathways completed within 18 weeks 35 34 35 35 43 36 36 38 42 54 Data completeness — — 48 51 47 41 36 75 527 70 Non-admitted pathways Percentage of pathways completed within 18 weeks 60 88 69 68 68 68 66 65 66 62 Data completeness — — — — — — — 69 57 52 Source: Monthly Referral To Treatment Data Collection.