By Professor John Robertson
From HSJ, the Health Service Journal, today:
Six more trusts have dropped into the “tier 1” group for the most challenged providers for their elective or cancer performance.
James Paget University Hospitals is now in tier 1 for both cancer and electives having previously been in tier 2 for both categories. Milton Keynes University Hospital, Lewisham and Greenwich and Portsmouth Hospitals University have been escalated to tier 1 for elective performance (See table 1: Trusts in tiers for 2024-25 quarter one).
Liverpool Women’s Hospital and Northern Lincolnshire and Goole have been placed in tier 1 for cancer. James Paget now has the highest proportion of patients waiting over 65 weeks of any trust in England (just over 4 per cent), followed by Milton Keynes (2.7 per cent). Eradicating 65-week waiters by September is NHS England’s next elective recovery goal – which they are desperate to hit after being forced to extend it from March.
[Note, these small percentages mean thousands of patients waiting more than 65 weeks!]
The tiering system groups trusts on performance and provides extra national oversight and assistance. It also gives an insight into which providers national leaders are most concerned about. The programme has been tweaked for 2024-25 so that it now also ranks providers specifically on diagnostics, as well as cancer and elective performance.
Direct comparisons are not possible but on oncology (cancer treatment) only 1 patient in the whole of Scotland (NHS Grampian) waited more than 52 weeks.
The equivalent term in Scotland for ‘most challenged’, I think, would be ‘special measures’. No health board in Scotland is in special measures for treatment.
The Scottish government does have formal “oversight” of six NHS boards but only due to poor performance in areas such as finance and leadership, not treatment.
Sources:
Talking-up Scotland / Facts on NHS, Crime, ferries and everything else you can think of 
As someone who has friends and family in the area covered by Lewisham and Greenwich Hospitals, this is disappointing news. A member of my family had surgery at Lewisham (not cancer) about 5 years ago. Her treatment went well and she had only an overnight stay before being released. Others have had appointments there for various minor matters and have been satisfied with the treatment.
However, on the occasions when my wife and I have visited friends or family at the hospital, it is clear that the valiant staff are under a lot of pressure. It is of note that Lettuce Truss, James Cleverley and several other Tories live in the Greenwich Hospital area, but, of course, they do not go for the kind of services the hoi polloi get.
Still, Labour are going to get the private sector to clear the backlog. Mr Wes Streeting, shadow Health Secretary, has received several donations from private health care companies.
Alasdair Macdonald.
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