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Madrid sets a record for patients waiting for an operation: more than 114,000
Waiting for an operation has become an everyday reality for more and more patients in Madrid's public health system. July ended with 114,627 people awaiting a procedure, the highest figure in the recent series and 22% higher than the figure recorded a year earlier.
The average structural delay stood at 57 days, but that average conceals very different situations. More than 16,600 patients had accumulated between three and six months of waiting, and 1,039 had already been waiting more than half a year for an operation.
For some families, those months end up shaping far more than a date on the calendar. Pain that prevents normal walking, successive treatments, sick leave or postponed family plans turn the wait for healthcare into an issue that becomes fully embedded in domestic routine.
There are also patients who decide to seek a way out outside the public system. This is the case for people who, after months waiting for tests or procedures, turn to savings or insurance to have surgery privately and reduce timeframes they consider hard to bear.
Madrid is, in fact, the region with the highest private health insurance penetration. According to the latest sector observatory, 37.3% of the population has it, compared with a Spanish average of 26.2%. The figure reflects the growing weight of dual coverage, although it does not allow the conclusion that all those policies are taken out because of waiting lists.
The full picture for July has another nuance. While pending operations increased, the total volume of appointments awaiting surgery, first consultations and diagnostic tests fell by just over 3% compared with June. The improvement was concentrated precisely in consultations and tests, not in operating theatres.
The Community of Madrid attributes part of the growth in the surgical waiting list to population growth, greater diagnostic activity and patients who refuse to be referred to another hospital or who temporarily cannot be scheduled. Almost a quarter of the total are in one of these latter two situations.
The system is also carrying the impact of doctors' strikes in recent months. The Department itself put their effect at more than 18 million euros in June and then counted more than 11,000 cancelled surgeries, as well as hundreds of thousands of postponed consultations and tests.
July's figure thus reveals two different speeds in Madrid healthcare: fewer pending appointments overall, but more people than ever waiting specifically for an operation. For someone on that list, the statistic translates into something much more concrete: another week watching the phone, waiting for the hospital's call finally to come.