One in seven people in England who need hospital care are not receiving it because their GP referral is lost, rejected or delayed, the NHS’s patient watchdog has found.
Three-quarters (75%) of those trapped in this “referrals black hole” suffer harm to their physical or mental health as a result of not being added to the waiting list for tests or treatment.
Communication with patients is so unreliable that seven in 10 (70%) only discover they have not been put on a waiting list after chasing up the NHS because they have not been told a hold-up has occurred. In some cases referrals that GPs have agreed to make do not even get sent from their surgery to the hospital, Healthwatch England’s findings show.
The research found that 14% of all referrals are getting “stuck” between GPs and hospitals, leaving patients in the dark and anxious about when they will be seen and treate
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