Hospital Trust Earns £460k for List Cleanup

The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SaTH) has received more than £460,000 for its participation in three government-sponsored "validation sprint" exercises. These exercises, conducted between April 2025 and March 2026, focused on "cleansing" patient waiting lists.

During these sprints, 14,148 patients were identified as no longer requiring care or were removed as duplicate entries. SaTH was incentivised with a payment of £33 per validated removal, contributing to the substantial sum received. These efforts were designed to reduce existing backlogs and ensure waiting lists more accurately reflected current demand.

This initiative also helped SaTH address "legacy data issues" from a recent system migration that had artificially inflated its waiting list numbers. The trust was also working towards a target of having at least 60% of patients waiting no longer than 18 weeks by March 2026, achieving 63.1% by February 2026. Improvements have been attributed to a new elective surgery hub and enhanced outpatient, theatre, and diagnostic services.