Nine operations cancelled every day last year in Lincolnshire

Almost nine operations were cancelled every day on average at Lincolnshire hospitals last year, according to Freedom of Information data.

United Lincolnshire Hospitals Trust said administrative errors were to blame, 828 for this reason out of a total of 3,108 cancellations in 2017/18.

Northern Lincolnshire and Goole Hospitals Trust had a total of 1,081 cancellations last year, an average of nearly three a day.

Matthew Frost, who lives in Scopwick near Lincoln, had his minor operation for a blocked saliva gland cancelled four times in the last month.

He said: “The latest excuse I was given was very vague and disappointing. It was just ‘the doctor can’t make it in today’.”

ULHT blamed winter pressures and said it is changing the way operations are planned to reduce cancellations in the future.