Orthopaedic departments will have more difficulty meeting 18 week waiting target

Experts have highlighted considerable hurdles facing the NHS as it prepares to meet the government's 2008 deadline for eliminating waiting times of more than 18 weeks.

Last month, the then health minister Andy Burnham said that long delays between referral by a GP and hospital treatment would be banished for good, with no one waiting more than 18 weeks, by December next year.

He said, “This is in my view the end of waiting. I think this represents the culmination of our 10 year programme.”

At a meeting of clinicians and Department of Health civil servants last week, however, warnings were sounded …