Photo: 123rf
Waiting lists for a first specialist appointment have jumped by 46 percent in Counties Manukau.
Te Whatu Ora figures to the end of December show 6637 people in Counties Manukau have been waiting four months or more for a first specialist appointment.
That was up from 4546 at the same time in 2021 - a 46 percent increase.
Patients were expected to see a specialist within four months of being referred by their doctor. It was often the first step towards people getting much-needed treatment or surgery.
Many on the list were waiting for orthopaedics, with a number needing knee or hip replacements.
Meanwhile, 1569 people were waiting for non-acute elective surgery at the end of December - a 69 percent jump from the 927 recorded in December 2021.
Manukau resident Nooroa Tamarua has been waiting for knee replacement surgery since 2019. Photo: LDR / Stephen Forbes
Manukau resident Nooroa Tamarua has been waiting for knee replacement surgery since 2019 and has had to rely on crutches to walk for two years.
The early childhood teacher said hearing that people were waiting more than four months just for their first specialist appointment was a serious concern.
"That's shocking," she said.
Tamarua was expecting to have her operation at the start of the year, but she was now waiting to hear when she can get it done. She said she would have to continue to take painkillers until she had surgery.
National Party health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti said the increase in the waiting lists had been driven by a combination of workforce shortages and Te Whatu Ora's failure to meet its own targets.
"Te Whatu Ora has no plan and things are getting worse, not better," Reti said.
Association of Salaried Medical Specialists executive director Sarah Dalton said hospitals just did not have the staff or the capacity to cope with patient numbers.
"So any blow-out in waiting times isn't surprising," Dalton said. "But a 46 percent increase [in patients waiting four months or more for a first specialist appointment] is large.
"I think that what it shows is there are people out there that are really suffering."
Royal New Zealand College of General Practitioners president Samantha Murton said there could be a multitude of reasons for why a particular area was seeing a spike on waiting list numbers.
But she said when patients faced delays in getting surgery or treatment, it often led to greater pressure on primary health care providers, who had to step into the breach.
"We do end up with extra work while people are waiting and I think it's even worse for the patients because their problems aren't being solved," Murton said.
But she said it was important GPs continued to refer patients when they needed to see a specialist.
In May last year, then Health Minister Andrew Little launched a planned care taskforce, led by Counties Manukau Health chief medical officer Andrew Connolly, to look at how to reduce waiting lists.
The taskforce delivered its findings in October, with 101 recommendations, including giving GPs greater abilities to diagnose patients, moving patients between regions for care and an increased use of the private sector.
Te Whatu Ora national director of hospital and specialist services Fionnagh Dougan acknowledged the distress current wait times could have on people who were awaiting treatment.
During the lockdowns of 2020 and 2021 a "significant number" of clinical appointments were cancelled throughout the country, which had hampered its ability to deliver non-acute elective surgery, Dougan said.
"These patient deferrals then tip over into the next month, creating bulges in waitlists that are occurring at a higher rate than treatment can keep pace with."
The government allocated $282.5 million in funding in 2020 over three years to increase planned care delivery and reduce waiting lists and a further $89m last year to reduce the number of people waiting more than a year for surgery, Dougan said.
Health Minister Ayesha Verrall was approached for comment.
Local Democracy Reporting is Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air