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Commenting on the King's Fund report published yesterday analysing NHS waiting times and performance, Nigel said: "The NHS is under real pressure to find financial savings, cope with rising demand and respond to the challenge of the current health reforms, and dealing with all of that may well be making hitting targets for treatment waits difficult in some areas.

Not a simple picture

"These figures show that waits for longer than 18 weeks are up but that diagnostic waiting times are down, along with good news on hospital acquired infections so the picture is by no means a simple one.

Greater freedom

"In general the relaxation of targets gives hospitals greater freedom to treat patients based on clinical needs rather than the time they have been waiting, but we need to ensure that if they are being taken away or reduced in importance there are still mechanisms to ensure that patients can expect treatment to be timely and not subject to unnecessary delay. 

No simple solution

"The Government's drive to measure the quality of patient care on outcomes rather than solely through crude target measurements has the potential to genuinely deliver better care for patients. But this is by no means a simple solution, measuring outcomes is extremely complicated and will require real work if we are going to genuinely measure improvements being made to care."

Nigel was quoted in various media outlets following the publication of The King's Fund report, including an interview on BBC Radio 4 Today programme. See 'External links' for details.

Read the report in full on The King's Fund website.