McGimpsey must act on consultants
HEALTH Minister Michael McGimpsey must step in to investigate why so many hospital appointments are being cancelled by consultants.
The minister has successfully led from the front in the battle to streamline our health service and make it more efficient for everyone.
But urgent action is needed after the latest figures released by the Department of Health.
Consultants were unavailable for almost 50,000 hospital appointments last year and a further 28,000 were cancelled by the consultants.
There were another 11,000 cases of administrative error by the hospital or GP.
The figures are simply not good enough.
Consultants play a vital role in the health of this community and it is understandable that they cannot fulfil all their appointments for a variety of reasons.
But they cannot hide from these latest figures, which make depressing reading, and they need to tell us why they were unavailable for up to 1,000 apointments every week.
As the Patient and Client Council said yesterday, there needs to be clarity around why appointments are cancelled.
Whatever the reason, the public, who pay the consultants their very healthy pay packets, have the right to ask questions that go to the heart of this problem.
Michael McGimpsey must investigate the matter urgently and, if he rattles a few cages along the way, so be it.
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Weather for Belfast
Tuesday 14 February 2012
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Temperature: 6 C to 9 C
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