Surgical waiting lists in Spain

The surgical waiting list of the public health system is one of the unknowns that most worries people waiting for surgery in the coming months to treat their pathology. For this reason, we would like to inform you of the average waiting times by speciality.

According to reports published by the Ministry of Health, Consumer Affairs and Social Welfare on Waiting Lists in the National Health System (data from 2019), the average waiting time for surgery in the Social Security system is 115 days.

Surgeries for non-serious and non-urgent procedures tend to have the longest waiting times. For this reason, many patients seek alternatives to public health care, in some cases opting for the option offered by private health care.

At Operarme, a company belonging to the Caser Group, we specialise in private medical-surgical services at a national level, to provide a solution to these non-serious and non-urgent cases. 

Our priority is customer service and speed in the management of surgical processes. 

For this reason, we manage our surgeries in an average time of 15 days, from the time of the surgical assessment consultation.

First of all, it is important to clarify what waiting lists are. As the name suggests, these are lists that include all patients who are awaiting a scheduled test or surgical procedure, i.e. not urgent and accepted by the patient.

Waiting lists include both outpatient interventions and procedures that require the patient to be admitted to hospital.

But what criteria are used to establish waiting times? These are mainly the following:

• Seriousness of the illness or reason for the care: those with a serious diagnosis will be given higher priority.
• Effectiveness of the intervention: those in which surgical intervention is considered to be much more effective than any other treatment in increasing survival, reducing disability or improving quality of life will be given priority.
• Timeliness of intervention: consideration will be given to patients in whom early surgery would prevent disease progression or sequelae.

According to the latest data published by the Ministry of Health in June 2019, there were a total of 671,494 patients on the waiting list. These figures will have increased in 2020, after the slowdown caused by emergency care to alleviate the effects of COVID 19.

The average waiting time in the public healthcare system in 2019 was 115 days and in Operarme, it was 15 days.

According to the National Health System Report (SECRETARIA GENERAL DE SANIDAD Y CONSUMO , 2019), as of 30 June 2019, almost 16% of patients on the Social Security List have been on the list for more than 6 months.

Below you will find a comparative table of the specialities with the longest waiting times in the Social Security and the average time for the surgeries managed by Operarme:

(Source: SNS Waiting Lists Information System (SISLE-SNS) RD 605/2003)

*Operarme does not include the speciality of Neurosurgery.

As in the previous case, the Spanish National Health System also collects (June 2019 report) data by specific surgical procedures.

In the following table you can see the waiting times in the public health system for some of the main surgeries, compared to the waiting times of Operarme.

(Source: NHS Waiting List Information System (SISLE-SNS) RD 605/2003).

At Operarme, we are specialists in the private management of surgical procedures, with a selection of professionals in each of the areas we treat (General Surgery, Traumatology, Urology, etc.).

In addition, we are present throughout Spain, so you can access all available treatments in the best private hospitals in your city.

Our company has a wide portfolio of medical professionals and centres, so we can speed up the process. In fact, the surgical waiting time at Operarme is 87% shorter than in the public health system.

A key factor in achieving this reduction in waiting times is the immediacy of all the elements related to the surgical process. The agreements that unite us with the private centres we work with are based on immediate and quality management:

• Immediate and personalised patient care: we have a Patient Care Team trained to efficiently manage all your surgical needs.
• Surgical assessment consultation: we offer you a first consultation with the specialist, immediately, to confirm the diagnosis and the real need for surgery.
• Preoperative study: if you finally decide to have surgery with us, it will be necessary to carry out a preliminary study of your state of health to ensure the success of the operation. In any case, the tests (blood tests, electrocardiogram and chest X-ray) are included in the price of the procedure.
• Free transfer service: in surgeries with a hospital stay, on the day of admission, a car, at the company's expense, picks up the patient at home and takes him/her to the hospital, returning him/her on the day of discharge.
• Medical complications insurance: medical complications insurance is included to cover possible eventualities occurring during surgery and in the 30 days following the operation, including reoperation if necessary.

It is possible that you have the indicated diagnosis and medical approval to treat your problem surgically. If so, we remind you that through our platform, you can request a first surgical assessment consultation by clicking on the Request Appointment buttons.

It is important that in this first consultation you bring all the specialist tests to confirm whether or not surgery is advisable.

If you need more information about us or our surgical procedures, we invite you to contact our Patient Service Team on +34 91 141 33 56, via this contact form to solve any queries you may have.

• OCU. Organización de Consumidores y Usuarios. Listas de espera sanidad pública. Recuperado 12 de mayo de 2020, de https://www.ocu.org/salud/derechos-paciente/calculadora/listas-de-espera-sanitarias
• SISLE-SNS. (2019). SISTEMA DE INFORMACIÓN SOBRE LISTAS DE ESPERA EN EL SISTEMA NACIONAL DE SALUD. Datos por Comunidad Autónoma. Recuperado de https://www.mscbs.gob.es/estadEstudios/estadisticas/inforRecopilaciones/docs/Datos_CCAA_jun2019.pdf
• SISLE-SNS. (2019). SISTEMA DE INFORMACIÓN SOBRE LISTAS DE ESPERA EN EL SISTEMA NACIONAL DE SALUD. Indicadores Resumen. Recuperado de https://www.mscbs.gob.es/estadEstudios/estadisticas/inforRecopilaciones/docs/LLEE_SNS_IndicadoresResumen_Junio2019.pdf