FOI 2026/1787

I am writing to you under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to request the following information from your organisation related to ophthalmology referrals. Please may you provide me with an answer to the following:

1. Total ophthalmology referrals by month from January 2025 to the most current month for which data is available, broken down by receiving provider.
2. If known or readily available, please could you provide data on how many of these referrals related to cataracts?
3. If known or readily available, please could you provide data on the number of referrals rejected and/or returned to the referring organisation?
4. Is a Single Point of Access (SPOA) in place for ophthalmology within your ICB area? If so, please confirm the organisation(s) who operates it?
5. In the last six months, has your ICB issued any guidance to the ophthalmology SPOA regarding the triage of referrals or the allocation of referrals to specific providers?

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Please provide the information in an email, Excel or Word document (whichever is most convenient).

If it is not possible to provide the information requested due to the information exceeding the cost of compliance limits identified in Section 12, please provide advice and assistance, under the Section 16 obligations of the Act, as to how I can refine my request.

1. NHS Greater Manchester (NHS GM) do not hold this information in its entirety as not all referrals received by our providers go through our Eye Care Navigation Service. We have referral information from September 2025, any activity required prior to this will need to be obtained from our individual providers. We do not routinely request this by individual provider so you will have to contact Primary Eye Care Services for this information.

For the information that NHS GM does not hold, we would recommend that you contact the providers.  To assist you, please find below links to their websites with information about how to make a Freedom of Information request.

The NHS Providers to be included from your list are as follows:

Bolton NHS Foundation Trust – Freedom of information – Bolton NHS FT (boltonft.nhs.uk)

Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust – Freedom of Information – Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust (mft.nhs.uk)

Stockport NHS Foundation Trust – Freedom of information – Stockport NHS Foundation Trust

Northern Care Alliance NHS Foundation Trust – Freedom of Information Requests :: Northern Care Alliance

Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust – WWL Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust | FOI Disclosure Log

We also have a number of Independent Sector providers:

Anglia Community Eye Service Ltd (ACES)

Community Health and Eyecare (CHEC)

Optegra UK limited

Practice Plus Group Hospitals Limited (PPG)

SpaMedica Limited

New Medical Systems Ltd trading as Newmedica

2. See above.
3. NHS GM do not hold this information and this is not something we ask our Single Point of Access to report on currently.
4. Yes, with Primary EyeCare Services.
5. No. Primary EyeCare Service have developed their own triage guidance which reflects the GM commissioned Ophthalmology services and the individual Provider provision.