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Wednesday, March 03, 2010
Woman waiting since 2007 to see a specialist
BY MARIAN HARRISON
A MAYO woman has been waiting to see an ENT (ear, nose and throat) specialist at Mayo General Hospital for two and a half years, the Western People has learned.
The patient’s GP referred her to the clinic with headaches and nasal problems in November, 2007. She had forgotten she had sought the consultation until a waiting list review letter arrived in her letterbox last week.
“I went private and it’s just as well I did. I’d still be suffering two and a half years later without an appointment.”
The letter said the hospital was updating its outpatient waiting list for appointments to the ENT clinic but did not indicate when an appointment would be secured.
The young woman is not the first patient on the ENT list, with others waiting since January, 2007.
The Western People understands an ENT specialist only travels from Galway to Castlebar once a fortnight resulting in the backlog.
A spokesperson for the HSE said the hospital was working on reducing waiting times for a number of specialties, including the ENT service.
“We are asking everyone who has received a letter regarding the ENT service to respond as soon as possible as it helps us to plan the service and ensure that all the appointment slots for each clinic are filled,” said the spokesperson.
“The patients who respond to these letters and confirm to the hospital that they still require an appointment will receive an appointment offer within the next two months.”
There are a total of 932 patients on the ENT waiting list for Mayo General Hospital. When patient referrals are received from GPs they are triaged by the consultant staff and categorised on the basis of urgency.
Hospital bosses hope to reduce the waiting time to six months or less by the end of this year.
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