Press release: NHS Confederation comments on review of diagnostic services by the Healthcare Commission

25 Aug 2006

Dr Gill Morgan, chief executive of the NHS Confederation which represents over 90 per cent of NHS organisations, said:

"This seems a very fair assessment by the Healthcare Commission. There have been overall improvements but it is clear that problems remain. It is only by further reducing waits for diagnostic services that we will meet the 18-week target.

"We have known for some time about the bottleneck in waits for diagnostic scans. There has been significant investment in making new providers available to help with this problem but it needs skilled management to ensure that results of diagnostic tests and scans are made available to individual NHS trusts.

"This report by the Healthcare Commission highlights that there is still much to be done in this area. We need to focus on the patient journey to ensure that the mechanisms we put in place to help reduce waits do not cause more delays as information is transferred between organisations."

ENDS

Notes for editors

The NHS Confederation represents more than 92% of the organisations that make up the NHS throughout the UK. Its members include the majority of NHS trusts, foundation trusts, primary care trusts and health authorities in England; trusts and local health boards in Wales; NHS boards and special boards in Scotland; and health and social service trusts and boards in Northern Ireland.

Contact details

Contact Media Relations Manager Joanna Clason on 020 7074 3306 or 07798 571078 or Media Officer Amy Darlington on 020 7074 3304 or 07779 668 015.

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