The number of people waiting over a year for a public hospital outpatient appointment dropped to 4,626 at the end of December, down 95% on the March figure of 103,433, Health Minister James Reilly announced last night.

However, he admitted that, while there had been substantial reductions, waiting list targets had not been fully achieved last year.

According to previous figures released yesterday, there were 56,270 patients waiting over a year on outpatient lists at the end of November, which means that  according to the new figures, over 50,000 patients were cleared from outpatient lists in a month.

Minister Reilly said in addition, in overall terms there had been a reduction of 25% since March in the total number of patients waiting for an outpatient appointment, with over 100,000 additional outpatient appointments provided in 2013 versus 2012.

Dr Reilly said the reduction by 95% in the numbers on the list for over 12 months 'represents real progress in our health system', which had been achieved through initiatives from the Special Delivery Unit and the National Treatment Purchase Fund

The Minister had pledged to have no-one waiting over 12 months for an outpatient appointment by the end of last year.

He said there had been further reductions in treatment waiting lists in hospitals at the end of last year, with 99.99% of adult patients on the waiting lists waiting less than eight months for treatment at the end of December.

In addition, 95% of children waiting for hospital treatment were waiting under 20 weeks at the end of December.

The Minister had promised to have no-one waiting over eight months for hospital treatment by the end of last year.

He admitted that the waiting list targets have not been fully achieved in 2013.

"A huge amount of work remains to be done on this issue but I congratulate all those involved and I know plans have been made by the Special Delivery Unit working with the HSE to move from the high 90s to 100% achievement against all the targets set."