The number of patients waiting to see a hospital consultant has reached a new record high of almost 570,000.
Patient advocate, Stephen McMahon, said the latest figure from the National Treatment Purchase Fund showed that the Government was failing to tackle the situation.
Mr McMahon, who is chairman and founder of the Irish Patients’ Association, said it also illustrated the huge inequality in the healthcare system.
“It is a major cause of concern that there are 106,786 people alone waiting over 18 months to see a consultant,” he said.
“To have a situation where people are waiting in pain for so long for public hospital treatment is unacceptable.”
Last month 569,498 patients were waiting for their first outpatient consultation in a public hospital, compared to 564,829 at the end of July.
There were 177,748 people waiting more than a year to see a consultant and they made up over 30% of the total number.
President of the Irish Hospital Consultants’ Association, Dr Donal O’Hanlon, said there seemed to be no end of the record numbers waiting to see a hospital consultant, with 53,336 patients added to the outpatient list already this year.
