Waiting lists: 1.6 million more treatments completed on time, but 2.8 million appointments still ‘out of the system’

“Step by step, whilst challenges remain but alongside encouraging results, we are beginning to manage waiting lists through data, expertise and dialogue with the regions.” Angelo Tanese, Director-General of the Agency for Regional Health Services (Agenas) – which, under the ‘Schillaci Act’, has been entrusted with managing the national platform that monitors the issue – highlights an initial shift in tackling the main shortcoming in the healthcare system for citizens – and for the government. And this is beginning to bear fruit, as confirmed by the first Bulletin, which reports an improvement in the first six months of this year (compared with the same period in 2025), as well as a number of issues that remain highly mixed. Such as the 2,811,000 appointments – to be precise – that the regions are still delivering beyond the guaranteed timeframes. The first positive aspect is that, of these – the absolute number of which has risen from 2.782 million last year due to the overall increase in activity – the number of bookings made with delays within the maximum time limit has risen from 552,000 to 606,000. But this is merely a first glimmer of hope.

The decidedly brighter picture is provided by the more than 1.6 million additional consultations and tests carried out within the guaranteed timeframes, albeit with variations between regions and between services. In its report, which allows users to “track, month by month and region by region, the trend in waiting times for 14 types of initial consultations and 22 diagnostic tests”, Agenas highlights an increase in the number of initial consultations provided within the guaranteed timeframes from around 5.8 million to 6.6 million, with 757,000 more services provided in the first half of 2026 compared with 2025, and an increase in diagnostic tests from 4.7 million to 5.5 million – equivalent to 857,000 additional tests carried out within the maximum time limit. In total, 1.624 million treatments that the NHS was able to provide to citizens in accordance with the law. This is the (good) reason why Tanese speaks of a trend that, on the whole, ‘remains positive’, particularly given the ‘very positive’ figures showing improvements in services classified as urgent (3 days) and short-term (10 days). ‘The National Platform now provides a fundamental information base, and we will expand it over time to include other services – that is our promise –: we have built a system based on data that was not previously available in such a systematic way, and this allows us to act in a more targeted and timely manner. “Agenas is working with every single region, in a spirit of collaboration and ongoing dialogue,” concludes the Director-General.

Initial oncology appointments have the highest rate of compliance with guaranteed waiting times, and this figure has improved further, rising from 94.2 per cent to 95.2 per cent in the first half of this year. There were also positive signs for initial gastroenterology appointments (from 70.8% to 74.7%), pulmonology appointments (from 77.7% to 80.9%) and physiatry appointments (from 78.5% to 82.7%).

The most significant improvement when comparing the first half of 2025 with the first half of 2026 relates to dermatology appointments – as noted in the Agenas Bulletin – which, whilst remaining one of the services with the lowest rates of compliance with guaranteed waiting times, rose from 65.5 per cent to 70.2 per cent.

Among diagnostic tests, the most significant recovery has been in colonoscopies, which recorded the largest increase of all the procedures monitored, rising from 60.8% to 69.8%.