Three new specialist health centres to open in Leeds including Armley and Beeston for rapid NHS scans, tests and checks

Sites in Armley, Beeston and Leeds City Centre will, according to the Government, help patients “benefit from quicker access to treatment and lifesaving diagnostic tests close to home”.

It is hoped the new centres, of which there are 19 across the country, will help eliminate 18-month waits for treatment by April 2023 and waits of longer than a year by March 2025.

The scheme will see private healthcare providers commissioned by the NHS to provide extra support to help reduce waiting times.

Health and Social Care Secretary Steve Barclay said: “The NHS is facing an unprecedented challenge to tackle Covid backlogs.

“Hardworking staff have made strong progress but I want to turbocharge our current plans to bust the backlog and help patients get the treatment they need.

“The taskforce will look at sensible steps to utilise all existing capacity to slash waiting lists while ensuring the NHS always remains free at the point of use.”

The sites will be om Armley Moor Health Centre and Beeston Village Health Centre, while the location of the Leeds city centre clinic is yet to be confirmed.

NHS England National Director of Elective Recovery Sir James Mackey said: “NHS staff are working incredibly hard to tackle the Covid backlog at a time of immense pressure on the health service with significant progress already made – virtually eliminating two year waits for care - and it’s vital that we continue to support staff to deliver for patients.

“By maximising opportunities to deliver even more life-saving checks and tests, building on the successes of increasing use of the independent sector since the pandemic, we can speed up diagnoses and continue to bring down waiting lists for routine care.”

Chief Executive of the Independent Healthcare Providers Network, David Hare said: "We strongly welcome the establishment of a new taskforce to look at how the NHS can turbo-charge its use of the independent sector to tackle the elective care backlog.

"For decades independent sector capacity has been used by the NHS to improve patients’ access to care free at the point of use.”