Waiting lists for treatment at University Hospital Waterford are impacting the whole South East region, Sinn Fein's David Cullinane told WLR.
The party's health spokesperson was reacting to recent figures showing almost 50,000 people are now awaiting hospital treatment at University Hospital Waterford.
43,500 people are waiting to be assessed by a Consultant at UHW, with almost 5,000 people awaiting inpatient/day case or endoscopy procedures.
UHW has largest ENT and Dermatology lists in Ireland at present, as thousands of people wait for an outpatient appointment with a consultant.
Some patients are waiting as long as ten years for treatments.
Deputy Cullinane says the figures presented by the NT-PF are stark.
A listener to Déise tells his story..
Frances, a Déise Today listener, told Damien Tiernan that he waited nine years and four months to see an orthopaedic consultant at UHW. He spoke about being on painkillers for almost a decade. He said he followed up every now and again with his GP to see if there was any sign of an appointment, and finally he got notification from the hospital. "At that stage I thought they'd forgotten all about me, or my file had gone missing," he said.
Francis told Damien that over the years the pain "sometimes got very bad," and that when he was seen to recently, his consultant told him his condition has deteriorated considerably in the nine years wait, with cartilage entirely gone between two bones in one part of his spine.
This means Francis is now awaiting an MRI, which will determine whether he needs surgery to deal with the cartilage problem.
You can listen to the full interview here...
