THE executive will have "failed" if it does not tackle long waiting lists, a leading health charity has said.
Northern Ireland Chest Heart and Stroke said although several issues affecting patients need to be addressed, including improvements in the early detection and prevention of heart attacks and stroke, long waiting lists are at the root of many problems.
It said politicians must "agree to be judged on their ability to radically improve the current disastrous situation". And it said if waiting list targets are not met then all parties in the executive have failed.
Neil Johnston, the charity's public affairs and policy manager, said more than 300,000 people are on waiting lists.
"The current minister has set out a new Elective Care Framework, which sets a target of March 2026 for no patient to wait more than 52 weeks for a first outpatient appointment and inpatient day case treatment, or 26 weeks for a diagnostics appointment," he said.
"We need to know that all parties accept these as targets and that they all agree to be judged on delivery - regardless of who holds the Health Minister position.
"There are currently over 180,000 patients waiting more than a year for their first outpatient appointment.
"If that has not ended by March 2026 then not just the Health Minister but every single minister and every single party in the Executive has failed."
The charity said it is particularly concerned by long cardiac waiting lists.
"15,000 people are on the waiting list for echocardiography. 7,000 of these patients have been waiting over 26 weeks for this straight forward diagnostic examination," he said.
"Over 10,000 people are waiting for their first outpatient appointment with a cardiology consultant. Over 3,000 are waiting over a year, and this is up from only 147 as recently as 2016.
"Nearly 2,500 people are waiting for their first inpatient appointment with a cardiology consultant. Nearly 700 are waiting over a year - in 2016 this was only six."
