More than three and a half thousand adults were waiting for more than a year and a half to see a Consultant at Midwest Hospitals last month.
The latest figures from the National Treatment Purchase Fund show an additional 323 children were waiting more than 18 months for an inpatient or outpatient appointment at Ennis Hospital or University Hospital Limerick in March.
The overall number on waiting lists has dropped since the beginning of the year though, as Clare FM’s Fiona Cahill reports.
The latest NTPF figures show 30,339 adults were waiting for inpatient or outpatient appointments at UHL or Ennis Hospital in March, representing a 7% reduction on the end of January.
Of those, 3,593 were waiting 18 months to see a consultant, 3,818 for between 12 and 18 months and 15,581 for up to six months.
In terms of individual specialties, Dermatology had the highest numbers on the waiting list, followed by Ophthamology and ENT.
In addition, there were 4,393 children waiting for an inpatient or outpatient appointment at UHL or Ennis Hospital last month, a drop of 20 on the start of the year.
335 of those were on the waiting list at University Hospital Limerick for a year and a half, with only 7 children waiting more than 6 months for an appointment in Ennis.
