FOI Request
- Disclosure ID
- FOI/03213
- Request Date
- July 16, 2019
- Subject
- Cancelled Operations 05/09/2019
- Description
The total number of operations cancelled for non-clinical reasons, broken down by the cause of the cancellation, for example due to lack of beds, operating theatre capacity, staffing issues, and equipment failures. Please provide this information for each of the past three financial years (2016/17, 2017/18, 2018/19). In the total number of operations, broken down by cancellation reason, please include: • Elective operations cancelled at the last minute. For the purposes of this request, last minute means on the day the patient was due to arrive, after the patient has arrived in hospital or on the day of the operation or surgery. • Cancelled urgent operations.
- Response
Total Elective Cancelled –. we do not collect data for all cancellations off our theatre system in this way.
Cancelled urgent operations – Our systems do not differentiate between whether an operation was “urgent” or “life or limb saving” and to determine if we hold this information would require a manual trawl through paper records. This would constitute a disproportionate effort to retrieve and would exceed 18 hours. This information is therefore exempt on the grounds of cost (Section 12(1)).
Cancellation Reason 2016/17 2017/18 2018/19 Administrative Error 47 48 76 Anaesthetist unavailable 15 19 44 Transport Issue 3 1 1 Admin- Listed incorrectly on ORMIS 16 Admin-Notes/Listing Letter Missing 3 Day Surgery beds unavailable 12 Equipment or environment failure / unavailable 45 97 37 ICU/HDU beds unavailable 38 80 99 List Overrun 145 176 227 Surgeon or Anaesthetist unavailable 6 5 16 Theatre staff unavailable 17 22 44 Urgent Case / Emergency / Trauma took priority 62 101 70 Ward beds unavailable 196 570 131 Surgeon unavailable 42 38 24 Grand Total 616 1157 800