To ask the Minister of Health how many patients have been waiting (i) 12 to 25; (ii) 26 to 51; (iii) 52 to 77; (iv) 78 to 103; and (v) 104 or more, weeks for a first appointment with the pain clinic in each Health and Social Care Trust.

Outpatient waiting times are reported by my Department on a quarterly basis. These publications refer to the position at the end of a given quarter, detailing how many patients are still waiting for a first consultant led outpatient appointment broken down by HSC Trust, Specialty and length of time waiting.

The 2020/21 Draft Ministerial waiting time target, states that:

“By March 2021, 50% of patients should wait no longer than 9 weeks for a first outpatient appointment; with no patient waiting longer than 52 weeks.” This target is the same for all outpatient specialties, including Pain Management.

Quarterly National Statistics on Outpatient Waiting Times Information is published at the following link:

https://www.health-ni.gov.uk/articles/outpatient-waiting-times

Table 1 shows the length of time that patients have been waiting for a first Pain Management outpatient appointment in each HSC Trust at 31st March 2021.

Table 1: Pain Management waiting times as at 31st March 2021

Source: DoH Outpatient waiting times dataset