East Sussex Healthcare: all the key numbers for the NHS Trust in April

Tens of thousands of patients were waiting for routine treatment at East Sussex Healthcare in April, figures show.

A think tank has warned the Government is "moving in the opposite direction" from its goal of bringing waiting lists down.

NHS England figures show 60,330 patients were waiting for non-urgent elective operations or treatment at East Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust at the end of April – up from 58,638 in March, and 41,868 in April 2022.

Of those, 1,666 (3%) had been waiting for longer than a year.

The median waiting time from referral at an NHS Trust to treatment at East Sussex Healthcare was 17 weeks at the end of April – the same as in March.

Nationally, 7.4 million people were waiting to start treatment at the end of April.

Dr Sarah Scobie, acting director of research at the Nuffield Trust think tank said: "Yet another month of hitting a record high for the NHS waiting list will be very worrying for the government and shows it is moving in the opposite direction from its ambition to bring down waiting lists by 2025.

She said the charity is concerned by the speed and scale at which the backlog is growing.

"The NHS and its staff are throwing more and more resources at recovering the backlog as the summer months approach, but challenges, including industrial action and staff absences, make keeping up with the weight of demand incredibly difficult," she added.

Separate figures show 1.6 million patients in England were waiting for a key diagnostic test in April – the same as in March.

At East Sussex Healthcare, 7,333 patients were waiting for one of 11 standard tests, such as an MRI scan, non-obstetric ultrasound or gastroscopy at this time.

Of them, 1,080 (15%) had been waiting for at least six weeks.

Other figures show cancer patients at East Sussex Healthcare are not being seen quickly enough.

The NHS states 85% of cancer patients urgently referred by a GP should start treatment within 62 days.