To ask the Minister of Health, Social Services and Public Safety to detail (i) the process by which outpatient appointments are allocated; and (ii) whether hospital staff are advised to take into account where patients live in relation to the hospital, their age, and their ability to arrange travel to their appointments.

(i) Outpatient appointments are allocated on the basis of the patient’s clinical priority with urgent patients seen and treated first. Patients with the same clinical priority are treated in chronological order. The Health and Social Care (HSC) Trusts operate partial booking systems which allow patients to arrange their outpatient appointments for a date and time that suit them. Six weeks prior to appointment, patients are issued with a letter inviting them to contact the relevant HSC Trust to confirm or make an appointment. If a date does not suit, they are offered an alternative date and time.

(ii) HSC Trusts will take into account any specific needs for patients as far as possible and where these are known to the Trust, for example arranging a time, day or location to suit travelling distance and transport arrangements. However some specialities only hold clinics on certain sites so it is not always possible to give patients appointments at a location close to their home. In some cases, patients may be offered an appointment at a more distant site because it has shorter waiting times.