The number of people waiting for treatment or tests at Wigan's hospitals has dropped

NHS England statistics reveal how many people were waiting for non-urgent elective operations or treatment at Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (WWL) at the end of December.

There were 46,450 people on the waiting list, down two per cent from 47,410 patients at the end of November.

Of those, 1,281 (2.8 per cent) had been waiting for longer than a year, compared to 3.1 per cent the month before.

Nationally, an estimated 7.29m treatments were waiting to be carried out at the end of December, down from 7.31m treatments at the end of November.

Data has also been published showing the number of people on waiting lists at WWL for one of 14 standard tests, such as an MRI scan, non-obstetric ultrasound or gastroscopy, fell in December.

There were 13,022 people waiting, which was down 1.9 per cent from 13,278 people in November.

Of those waiting in December, 4,583 (35.2 per cent) had been waiting for more than six weeks, while 970 (7.4 per cent) had waited for more than 13 weeks.

This meant the proportion of people facing these longer waits had increased, from 30.6 per cent waiting more than six weeks in November and 5.5 per cent waiting more than 13 weeks.

The test which was most in demand was the non-obstetric ultrasound, which 4,975 people were waiting for, but 2,062 of those patients (41.4 per cent) had been waiting for six weeks and 354 for 13 weeks (7.1 per cent).

Among the other diagnostics, 2,861 people were waiting for an MRI and 2,199 waiting for an echocardiogram.

WWL carried out 9,833 diagnostic tests in December on people on the waiting lists, as well as 970 planned tests and 3,541 unplanned tests.

Sarah Brennan, WWL’s chief operating officer, said: “WWL is pleased to see steady progress in the reduction of our waiting times for elective surgery and diagnostic tests.

“Together with our partners, we remain focused on increasing access, improving efficiency and ensuring patients benefit from the impact of the region’s surgical hub programme, which continues to demonstrate strong improvements in waiting times and experience locally, in Greater Manchester and across the North West as a whole.”