Both the St Luke's Hospital customer care centre and the Health Ministry receive "very regular complaints" about long waiting times at the outpatients' department and other clinics in hospital.

And many of the delays are attributed to doctors starting their work behind time, sources said yesterday.

These complaints led to an inspection last week, when 19 doctors and consultants were found to have reported late for work last Wednesday.

Some of them were almost an hour late at work, and three of the medical practitioners who were not on time were supposed to be seeing patients at the outpatients' department.

In line with civil service procedures, the doctors have been asked to give their reasons in writing and unless there are reasons which the health department considers valid, a warning would be issued. Disciplinary action is taken after three such warnings.

The director of institutional health, John Cachia, said on Wednesday there were 450 doctors at St Luke's Hospital and most did their work with care and dedication and went beyond their call of duty. But, he added, one had to single out the good from the few bad as the latter gave the hospital a bad name.

"Patients should not end up waiting unnecessarily," Dr Cachia said.

The Medical Association of Malta slammed the media reports as "premature and unethical". MAM saw the reports as "an attempt to smear the entire medical profession".

But health department sources said the exercise was for the benefit of patients and meant to address the many complaints received by the health authorities.

"Certain consultants report late at the outpatients' department, creating long waiting times. Some consultants also work in private clinics when they are supposed to be giving their service at St Luke's. It is a known fact that during the early hours of the morning some consultants do private work and then report late for work," the sources said.

MAM general secretary Martin Balzan said doctors were very flexible and performed operations at 6 p.m. even though they were supposed to stop work at 2.30 p.m. and non-urgent operations were being performed on weekends and public holidays to keep waiting lists down.

However, the sources said that doctors and consultants are paid for any extra hours worked, or take time off instead.

MAM also said the long waiting times at the outpatients' department were often due to missing files, blood tests and X-rays.

The sources said, however, that certain consultants saw a number of their private patients at the outpatients' department.

"These are slotted in without having any appointment. To make matters worse, these are seen first, delaying those who do have an appointment.

"These patients are told by the consultants to go to the reception desk to make an appointment for another day. Having done this, they are seen that same day by the consultant. This leaves an appointment made for a future date, with no patient.

"These appointment slots with no patients are known as phantom appointments. In this way consultants have a number of vacant slots during which to see private patients.

"All scheduled appointments are taken care of days before the appointment date: all the necessary files, tests and X-Rays are prepared.

"Private patients brought unannounced by consultants cause a lot of disruption as they put undue pressure on the people at the medical records section, on staff at the outpatients' department and on other patients waiting to be seen," the sources said.

The sources said inspections on reporting late for work took place in the past and warnings had been issued to those doctors who could not justify turning up late.

The sources said a MAM official was among those who were found reporting late for work last week.