Powys patients to wait longer for treatment in English hospitals from Tuesday, after health board decision comes into force

Powys Teaching Health Board (PTHB) agreed in March to increase the waiting times for treating Powys residents in English hospitals as they look to bring their budget down by over £20 million next year.

Calls for the Welsh Government to step in and stop treatment for Powys patients being slowed down from politicians and local campaigners and a petition against the move –do not appear to have been successful.

From the beginning of July inpatients and day cases will receive planned care treatment in hospitals in Hereford, Shrewsbury and Telford and Oswestry based on the NHS Wales waiting time measures – which are slower than England’s.

Before July 2025, all planned care in Wales was delivered based on NHS Wales waiting time measures, and all planned care in England was delivered based on NHS England waiting time measures.

This change will not include cancer referrals, urgent and emergency referrals, appointments for under 18’s, people resident outside Powys, including if you are registered with a Powys GP, and follow up appointments and ongoing care for long term conditions (e.g. diabetes)

This change will not currently include planned care outpatients (new or follow up), although this is being kept under review.

A spokesperson for Powys Teaching Health Board said: “If you already have a date for your appointment or procedure, then this is not affected. Please attend your appointment as normal.

“You do not need to take any action. You will remain on the waiting list and the hospital will contact you to arrange your appointment. There is no need to contact your hospital provider or your GP practice to ask for an update on when your appointment will take place, or to expedite your appointment unless your symptoms have significantly changed. 

“This is not a decision we have taken lightly, and it reflects the way we are funded. We must take action to live within our means, or we will build up bigger financial difficulties for the future.”

More information is available from a new section of PTHB’s website with further information including FAQs at https://pthb.nhs.wales/news/health-board-news/information-about-waiting-times/

It comes as Wales’ Labour Government will be called on to declare a health emergency on Wednesday.

The Welsh Conservatives are calling for the action after the latest NHS statistics showed the equivalent of one in four Welsh people are on a waiting list.

The figures reveal NHS treatment waiting lists remain at 789,929 pathways, the equivalent of nearly 1-in-4 Welsh people.

Two-year NHS waits for treatment have risen again to 9,600 in Wales – an almost 15% rise from the previous month, compared with only 171 in England. 

The former Labour Health Minister, now First Minister, Eluned Morgan promised to eliminate these waits for the last two years - by March 2023 and again by March 2024, but failed to meet these targets and still has not.

The Conservatives say a health emergency needs to be declared to ensure sufficient resources and the entire apparatus of Government is focused on reducing waiting lists.

It comes in the light of a Senior Coroner’s decision, in a recent Prevention of Future Deaths report to the First Minister, to cite the Chief Executive of NHS Wales’ calls for “a health and social care system leadership response… on a par to the Covid-19 response”..

The Conservatives say the Welsh Government continues to miss all of its own targets.

Just 50% of red calls, the most serious, received an emergency/ambulance response within the eight minute target time, down on the previous month.

The proportion of patients waiting less than four hours in Welsh emergency departments decreased to 67.1%, despite the target being 95%.

Performance against the 62-day target for patient starting cancer treatment has dropped 3% to 60.5%, well below the target of 75%.

The average (median) time patient pathways are waiting for treatment in Wales stands at 22.5 weeks, compared to 13.3 weeks in England.

In 2019 the Welsh Labour Government declared a climate emergency. In 2021, a nature emergency was declared, the Tories say its only right that a health emergency is declared.

They will put the motion at the Senedd on Wednesday at around 5.30pm

Welsh Conservative Shadow Secretary for Health and Social Care, James Evans MS, said: “Labour is proving in real time that their health strategy is failing abysmally, with progress is in reverse, and waiting list statistics getting worse.

“It’s clear that shovelling taxpayers’ money at the waiting list crisis isn’t enough. We need a whole-of-government approach.

“That’s why the Welsh Conservatives are calling for a health emergency, to ensure that resources and the efforts of the whole Government are targeted at reducing these excessive waits.”

First Minister Eluned Morgan said: “"I've been listening to people across Wales and what I'm doing is responding to them by making sure that I'm listening and delivering on their priorities," she said.

She said the Welsh Government is "pouring money in" to reduce the longest waits for NHS treatment.

"So we are staring to deliver, because we've had that extra money," she says. 

"And we know people's patience is running out, but we are getting there.”

 The debate can be watched online at https://www.senedd.tv/Meeting/Live/14339b52-517d-4db6-ac58-1ab3cead2ba7