Development of the General Surgery Prioritisation Tool Implemented in New Zealand in 2018

Abstract Patients waitlisted for elective general surgery in New Zealand used to be prioritised by multiple tools that were inconsistent, did not reflect clinical judgement and were not validated. We describe the development and implementation of a national prioritisation tool for elective general surgery in New Zealand, which could be applicable to other OECD countries. The tool aims to achieve equity of access, transparency, reliability and should be aligned with clinical judgement. The General Surgery Prioritisation Tool Working Group commenced development of a prioritisation tool in 2014 which showed strong correlation with clinical judgement (r = 0.89), excellent test-retest reliability (r = 0.98) and significantly lower variability (p