'Surgery Delays Add To Joint Pain Patients' Misery'

A lawmaker has called on the government to take steps to help people who have been waiting for years to relieve joint pain, saying they are facing even more delays since the coronavirus situation forced public hospitals to postpone some non-essential surgery.

Civic Party lawmaker Kwok Ka-ki said some of these patients are facing a wait of up to five years for operations to get rid of their joint pain.

“They were waiting from 25 months to 61 months even before this Wuhan pneumonia,” said the lawmaker who is also a practising physician.

“Now they have to wait for an unknown period of time before they can have the surgery, as you can imagine these operations are being delayed as they are considered non-emergency operations.”

Public hospitals have taken such steps to focus on the threat posed by the coronavirus and reduce the risk of cross-infection within their facilities.

Kwok said even if public hospitals resume the operations, it will take a while for the backlog to be cleared.

The government should use its anti-epidemic fund to subsidise patients to get their surgery done in private hospitals, which have spare capacity and are relatively safe, he said.

Kwok told RTHK’s Richard Pyne that some patients waiting in pain for years are even unable to walk because of their conditions.