To ask the Minister of Health to detail the current (i) average; and (ii) maximum, waiting times for urgent red flag dermatology referrals, broken down by Health and Social Care Trust.

The Information and Analysis Directorate has provided the following statistical data for the average and maximum waiting times for urgent red flag referrals, broken down by Health & Social Care Trust.

The most recent official statistics for the median and 95th percentile waiting times for patients starting treatment following an urgent GP Referral for Skin Cancer during Quarter Ending March 2025 by Health and Social Care Trust, are given in Table 1 (overleaf).

Table 1: Median and 95th Percentile completed waits for patients starting treatment following an urgent GP Referral for Skin Cancer during Quarter Ending March 2025 by HSC Trust.

Notes:

‘Median’ and ‘95th percentile’ are used to assess the ‘average’ wait time in place of ‘mean’ or ‘maximum’ respectively. The median waiting time is the middle value when all patients are ordered by length of time waiting. This is preferred over the mean as an average of waiting times. The 95th percentile waiting time is the waiting time that 95% of patient waiting times are less than. One in twenty patients i.e. 5%, have been waiting longer than this time. The 95th percentile is used as an indication of the range of current waiting times without being distorted by extreme values or the prioritisation of urgent waits.

‘NA’ indicates that 95th percentile could not be calculated due to small numbers of patients.

Data for the Belfast, Northern and South Eastern Trusts are sourced from encompass system. Southern and Western data are sourced from legacy systems.