Under Canberra Health Services guidelines, Rohan Goyne should have been able to meet with a specialist to discuss his need for surgery within 90 days. He's been waiting almost a year and a half.
Rohan suffers from painful hernias as a result of a surgery several years ago.
With no private health insurance, he was referred to the public health system.
As a "Category 2" patient he was meant to be seen within three months, but after going on a waiting list in August 2021, he's still waiting.
"It could've reached the point according to my [general practitioner] where I just might no be able to be operated on," Mr Goyne said.
"But I just don't know because I haven't been able to go to an appointment and discuss it with a general surgeon."
Even with painkillers Mr Goyne's condition impacts his ability to work and carry out tasks around the home.
"I'm experiencing significantly more pain than I was 12 months ago," Mr Goyne said.
"It makes it difficult for me to do the gardening for example – lifting anything heavy due to the risk of damaging the hernias further."
Mr Goyne's no stranger to the idea of long waitlists.
He was an adviser to former ACT health minister Simon Corbell and the Stanhope Labor government in the late nineties and early 2000s.
"I'd expected to wait, I dunno, 180 to 200 days. I would have thought that was reasonable," Mr Goyne said.
"But once it's beyond 500 days in a circumstance where the benchmark is 90 days – that's not reasonable."
"It's completely unreasonable."
Figures paint a bleak picture
Canberra Liberals' health spokeswoman Leanne Castley says Mr Goyne's not alone.
A ministerial briefing from mid last year obtained by the opposition under freedom of information laws showed long delays in a range of surgical and non-surgical areas.
"These figures paint a very bleak picture for any Canberran that may need elective surgery in the future as well, as the tens of thousands of Canberrans who will have to live in pain and sometimes debilitating conditions until they are admitted," Ms Castley said.
"Our FOI reveals that there are thousands of Canberrans waiting far longer than what is clinically recommended despite promises from the minister to reduce these numbers."
The documents show 130 Category 1 patients — who guidelines recommend are seen in 30 days — were waiting an average of 163 days for ear, nose and throat surgeries.
Category 2, semi-urgent patients, are recommended to be seen within 90 days. But General Surgery specialty had more than 1,300 people waiting an average of 575 days for admission.
"This is simply not good enough. The pandemic just exacerbated the problem that we now see," Ms Castley said.
"This government hasn't done enough, they haven't prioritised the problem enough."
Appointment pre-screening, more specialist recruitment
ACT Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith denies waitlists haven't been a priority.
"There's been significant improvement in the waitlist despite all the challenges with COVID-19," Ms Stephen-Smith said.
"Over the last three years there's been a reduction in the waitlists.
"There used to be around 30,000 patients who used to have long waits for outpatient appointments. Now we have 30,000 people in total on the waitlist.
"People can be in pain and discomfort – unable to work or socialise in the way that they would like and we would absolutely recognise that. That's why we we've been working so hard to try to address these issues."
Ms Stephen-Smith said health services have been working to recruit more specialists to fill the shortfalls in some areas in the ACT.
Canberra Health Services chief operations officer Cathie O'Neill said more pre-screening work is being done to shorten appointment times, so more patients can be seen.
Ms O'Neill said around eight per cent of people on waitlists no longer require treatment.
"We've still got a lot of work to do," Ms O'Neill said.
"We have many people on our waiting lists who might have been referred to multiple providers – they might have been referred to a private waiting list. They might have even chosen to get treatment in Sydney, but they're still sitting on our waiting list.
"I'd really request that if those consumers can let us know – we've tried to make that as easy as possible through our website, or to call our central intake – so that we can offer those other appointments to people who need them."
