5. Statement by the Minister for Health and Social Services: Planned Care Recovery Plan

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 4:11 pm on 26 April 2022.

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Photo of Jenny Rathbone Jenny Rathbone Labour 4:11, 26 April 2022

Thank you. I congratulate you on not trying to fix a broken system, but instead to have a whole-system change. So, I fully support the work you outline in your plan.

Cataracts, hips and knees are the biggest issues that I find it very difficult how to advise constituents on, because they're obviously things that need to be done by specialists. I'm aware, for example, that a consultant orthopaedic surgeon up in north Wales has pioneered day-care knee surgery. How well is that pioneering work travelling to ensure that other people are also doing that sort of knee surgery, which involves, obviously, a multidisciplinary team of nurses and others, to ensure that people, including the patient's family, know how to do the exercises to enable all that to happen?

We need to change the way we think about things ourselves. I heard Peter Fox earlier decrying the fact that his constituent's children had only been able to see the hygienist, when, unless they've got special needs, the hygienist is the best person to check a child and give them a routine check.

Similarly, the optometrist providing an enhanced service is surely going to help us ensure that those who most urgently need to see the ophthalmologist will get seen. But it does require the ophthalmologist to look at the images that the optometrist is sending them. I know that this happens in Swansea Bay health board, which is why they have such a low level of waiting times. How are you going to get that sort of good practice embedded across the system so that people, those who really do need urgent cataract treatment, are going to the top of the list?