According to a report carried out by the Consumer Choice Center in 2023, the United States had the longest average wait for a primary physician appointment at almost three weeks. On the other hand, those in Switzerland only had to wait around two days for an appointment. In Spain, it was estimated that the average wait time for an elective surgery appointment was 77 days.

According to the 2024 survey, 85 percent of individuals in Hungary believed waiting times were too long. Even the best-performing country, Switzerland, still had over a quarter of Swiss respondents saying wait times were too long for a doctor's appointment. This statistic displays the share of individuals who thought waiting times to get an appointment with doctors were too long in select European countries in 2024.

Since 1993, the average waiting time for specialist medical treatment has been increasing in Canada. In 2024, it took someone in Ontario over 23 weeks wait to receive medical treatment after being referred by a general practitioner, whereas it took only nine weeks back in 1993. Overall, the average waiting time increased by 20 weeks in the country.

The average waiting time to see a guaranteed health care service in Poland was 4.2 months as of October/November 2024.

Relationship between GP demand and local hospital waiting times.

In 2024, Canada's median waiting time between a General practitioner (GP) referral to a specialist was 15 weeks. In addition, the median waiting time from a specialist appointment to treatment was another 15 weeks. In other words, the median wait from a referral by GP to treatment in Canada reached an average of 30 weeks in 2024. However, the median waiting times in Canada ranged from 23.6 weeks in Ontario to 77.4 weeks in Prince Edward Island. Wait times also varied widely by specialty, with those waiting for cancer radiation therapy waiting just 4.5 weeks between GP and treatment, while those waiting for an orthopedic surgery waited over a year.

In 2022, on average, outpatients had to wait for 11.8 days for an appointment at medical facilities in Saudi Arabia. This represented an decrease compared to a waiting time of 13.7 days in the previous year.

This statistic displays the average time patients are on the waiting list to receive mental healthcare in the Netherlands 2018, by illness (in weeks). In 2018, patients in the Netherlands had to wait nearly 20 weeks to receive treatment for personality-related disorders. In comparison, patients suffering from unexplainable pain and fatigue had to wait ten weeks on average before starting treatment.

This statistic shows the results of a survey asking South Koreans about their perception of waiting times for arranging a doctor's appointment, conducted by Ipsos as of May 2018. According to this survey, about 38 percent of respondents reported to agree with the statement that waiting times to get an appointment with doctors are too long in South Korea.

In 2023, Spain and Germany were the countries with the highest share of people who encountered long waiting lists when accessing mental health services with 87 percent and 81 percent respectively. On the other hand, Romania and Bulgaria were the countries with the lowest share of people indicating problems with long waiting lists to access mental health services.

In France, the average waiting time needed in order to obtain a medical appointment may be subject to variations depending on the type of doctor. In 2017, on average, six days elapsed between scheduling and going to an appointment with a general practitioner, compared with approximatively two months for a dermatologist.

According to the 2024 survey, 46 percent of adults worldwide stated access to treatment and/or long waiting times was the biggest problem facing the healthcare system in their country. Another 45 percent of adults mentioned that lack of staff was the biggest issue. This statistic shows the percentage of adults worldwide who stated select issues were the biggest problems facing the healthcare system in their country as of 2024.

This statistic displays the Chinese results of a survey on global views on healthcare in 2018. According to data provided by Ipsos, about 54 percent of respondents from China agreed that the waiting times to get a doctor's appointment were too long, while around 15 percent did not consider the waiting times as too long.

In November 2024, patients in Poland waited the longest for services in plastic surgery (9.9 months), neurosurgery (9.1 months), as well as pediatric otolaryngology (8.9 months).

In October 2024, only 58 percent of patients who attended a hospital accident and emergency (A&E) department in England were seen within four hours. This is among the lowest monthly share of attendees seen within four hours in the provided time interval and is well below the target; that 95 percent of patients in A&E should be seen within fours of arrival. The last month in which the four-hour target was met was in June 2013. As shown in the graph, the share of patients seen within four hours has been decreasing, although it shows signs of increasing again. The equivalent data for waiting times in all A&Es can be found here.

According to a survey conducted in Colombia in 2024, only around 38 percent of respondents trusted their country's health care system to provide the best health treatment. Moreover, 78 percent of interviewees believed that many people cannot afford good health care, while 77 percent considered that waiting times to get an appointment with doctors were too long. Affiliation to public healthcare In 2023, around 96 percent of Colombia's population was affiliated to the public health care system, which is divided into two main programs: the contributive program for wage earners and the subsidized scheme for everyone else. That year, only around 44 percent of those affiliated were part of the contributive program, mandatory for all Colombians earning at least the minimum wage. The department of Bogotá was the only region in Colombia where more than three quarters of the population were part of the contributive program, whereas the department of Chocó had the smallest share of contributive members at five percent. Healthcare resources As of 2024, there were 2,590 hospitals and 84,040 hospital beds available in Colombia. This translated to an average of 1.69 hospital beds available per 1,000 people across the country, with this figure expected to remain stable within the next five years. That same year, there were 2.44 physicians in the country per 1,000 population. This number is forecast to increase to 2.68 by 2029.

The number of patients waiting for a hospital bed on trolleys was over 9.7 thousand in the month of August 2023, the worst year in the provided time interval. Hospital overcrowding otherwise known as the 'trolley crisis' has been a problem before the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of patients waiting for hospital bed on trolley dropped to approximately 3.1 thousand in 2020. Since the summer of 2021, when restrictions have generally been lifted, overcrowding of hospitals has again been emerging. This statistic displays the number of individuals waiting on hospital trolleys in Ireland in the month of August 2006 to August 2023.

The average number of hospital beds available per 1,000 people in the United States was forecast to continuously decrease between 2024 and 2029 by in total 0.1 beds (-3.7 percent). After the eighth consecutive decreasing year, the number of available beds per 1,000 people is estimated to reach 2.63 beds and therefore a new minimum in 2029. Depicted is the number of hospital beds per capita in the country or region at hand. As defined by World Bank this includes inpatient beds in general, specialized, public and private hospitals as well as rehabilitation centers.The shown data are an excerpt of Statista's Key Market Indicators (KMI). The KMI are a collection of primary and secondary indicators on the macro-economic, demographic and technological environment in up to 150 countries and regions worldwide. All indicators are sourced from international and national statistical offices, trade associations and the trade press and they are processed to generate comparable data sets (see supplementary notes under details for more information).Find more key insights for the average number of hospital beds available per 1,000 people in countries like Canada and Mexico.

In 2023, Norway ranked first with a health index score of 83, followed by Iceland and Sweden. The health index score is calculated by evaluating various indicators that assess the health of the population, and access to the services required to sustain good health, including health outcomes, health systems, sickness and risk factors, and mortality rates. The statistic shows the health and health systems ranking of European countries in 2023, by their health index score.

This statistic displays the results of a survey asking individuals about their perception on the length of waiting times for doctors appointments in Japan in 2018. According to data provided by Ipsos, about 47 percent of Japanese respondents agreed that the waiting times were too long, while around 12 percent did not consider the waiting times as too long.