NHS to slash waiting lists by sending patients straight to GPs for treatment

13 June 2025, 19:26

Millions of patients could see GPs as an alternative to hospital treatment under Labour's plans to slash waiting times.

The government will published its ten-year plan next month which will reportedly focus on creating a 'neighbourhood health service'.

Under the shake-up, the traditional model of sending patients to hospitals for specialist referrals will be scrapped.

Instead, the majority of routine appointments will be moved to community services nearer to patient’s homes.

It includes GP surgeries as well as high street opticians, according to The Times.

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Health chiefs say the measure could 'fix the waiting list' - which Labour has vowed to cut..

Around 7.4 million Brits are currently waiting for treatment. Almost all of those are outpatients who do not require admission or surgery.

NHS bosses say around half the 135million hospital outpatient appointments each year are either 'pointless' follow-ups or consultations that could be done locally.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting said: “Much of what’s done in a hospital today will be done on the high street, over the phone, or through the app in a decade’s time.”

Along with NHS chief executive, Sir Jim Mackey, he revealed the system offering financial incentives to health service leaders for treating people in hospital rather than within the community will be overhauled.

The plans would see money sent to NHS regions based on the health outcomes of their populations, instead of hospital activity.

Mr Streeting said: “We will use financial incentives to invest more in public health outcomes, not just in more activity that reacts to sickness.”

Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, said that while reform would be a core part of the ten-year plan it may also be “difficult to achieve”.

He said: “The figures people are talking about are big. I’ve heard senior people at NHS England say we could have half as many outpatients appointments in five years in hospitals as you do now.

“The outpatient system is a legacy system. It is outdated and doesn’t work for a lot of patients. People are waiting too long and travelling to locations they don’t need to travel to.”

Millions of 'pointless' follow up appointments would also be scrapped under the plans, with patients able to request a follow-up only if they need one.

It comes after the NHS announced that millions more patients are set to receive appointment reminders, screening invitations, and test on their smartphones via the NHS app.

The health service is trying to make its app the go-to method of communication between the health system and patients.

This week, the NHS waiting list for planned hospital treatment fall to its lowest level for two years, figures revealed.

An estimated 7.39 million treatments were waiting to be carried out at the end of April, relating to 6.23 million patients - down from 7.42 million treatments and 6.25 million patients at the end of March.

These are the lowest figures since March 2023 for treatments and April 2023 for patients.

The news comes after Chancellor Rachel Reeves gave the NHS a cash injection worth an extra £29 billion per year.

In March, there was a rise in numbers waiting for treatment, which officials put down to seasonal fluctuations.

Within the new NHS figures, the number of longer waits has grown.Some 1,361 patients in England had been waiting more than 18 months to start routine treatment at the end of April, up from 1,164 in March.

There were 9,258 patients who had been waiting more than 65 weeks to start treatment, up from 7,381 the previous month.

Overall, 190,068 people in England had been waiting more than 52 weeks to start routine hospital treatment, up from 180,242 at the end of March.The figure had previously fallen for 10 months in a row.