The Department of Health has reduced by 3,107 the number of patients on the waiting list for surgery in the regions of Girona and Alto Maresme.

The manager of the health region, Jaume Heredia, has stated that this decrease is the result of the shock plan promoted by the Health Department and that it has resulted in a “record” of surgical interventions. Throughout 2023, 42,375 operations have been carried out in the district, 15.5% more than in 2019, in the last pre-pandemic year.

The manager highlighted that, in parallel with the increase in interventions, there has also been an increase in the number of new patients who need to undergo surgery.

2023 is the year with the highest number of patients on the waiting list since 2018. In the province, there have been 48,469. They are 10.8% more than the previous year (43,743) and 9.6% more than in 2019 (43,786).

Heredia emphasizes that there is less waiting list although, in parallel, 2023 has been the year with the highest number of patients in the last five: 10.8% more.

Thus, the health region has an average waiting time for an operation of 156 days, 70 less than in 2022.

The impact of the pandemic put the health system to the limit and the impact on normal activity increased waiting lists for surgical interventions. For this reason, the Health Department designed a shock plan, outlining a strategy to reduce them and operate on the patients who were in line.

According to their data, 42,375 interventions were carried out last year. They are 23% more than in 2022 (34,446) and 15.5% more than in 2019, in the last pre-pandemic year (36,665).

The more than 42,300 interventions encompass all the operations carried out in the hospitals of the public network of the Girona regions (Trueta de Girona, Santa Caterina de Salt, Palamós, Figueres, Olot, Campdevànol and Blanes-Calella) and, also, the surgical interventions who have been referred to the Girona Clinic and the Salus Infirmorum of Banyoles.

Heredia has explained that, in these two centers, they usually perform low-complexity operations (such as cataracts or prostheses). Here, about 3,000 annual interventions are carried out through the public network (they account for 6.8% of the total operations that come from the waiting list).