14 March 2025
Valentino Breckenridge
[FYI request #29551 email] Tēnā koe Valentino,
Your request for official information, reference: HNZ00075274
Thank you for your email on 15 December 2024, asking Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora for
the following under the Official Information Act 1982 (the Act):
For the last 5 years please provide the average waiting time in days from the date of
referral from GP to first specialist appointment and the waiting time from date of first specialist
appointment to surgical event for elective procedures in public hospitals.
Please provide this by PHO and also split by major specialty (general surgery, neurology,
respiratory, etc.).
Response
We do not hold detail of average time in days from referral to First Specialist Assessment (FSA) in
national datasets. Accordingly, this part of your request is refused under section 18(g) of the Act,
that the information is not held by Health NZ.
We can provide average days from ‘added to treatment waitlist’ to ‘treated’ dates. Please refer to
the attached appendix.
Please note that:
The waitlist data does not identify what PHO a patient belongs to, therefore district has been
provided instead.
All referrals have been included regardless of source; the majority will be from General
Practicioners.
Normal staged patients included only.
The specialties can be null for some years and/or districts because not all specialties are
used at every district and not all specialties will be used every year.
Causes of longer wait times may include COVID, clinical shortages, and increasing demand.
The data is provisional and used for operational purposes. It has not been through the full quality
assurance process that we use before publishing data and therefore is subject to change.
How to get in touch
If you have any questions, you can contact us at
[email address].
If you are not happy with this response, you have the right to make a complaint to the
Ombudsman. Information about how to do this is available at
www.ombudsman.parliament.nz or
by phoning 0800 802 602.
As this information may be of interest to other members of the public, Health NZ may proactively
release a copy of this response on our website. All requester data, including your name and
contact details, will be removed prior to release.
Nāku iti noa, nā
Rachel Haggerty
Director, Funding - Hospitals
Planning, Funding and Outcomes
