MORE than a quarter of children with eating disorders seen by the Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust are waiting too long to begin their treatment.

Leading mental health charities have warned that a “postcode lottery” is leaving many youngsters struggling to access the care they need, with “patchy” services leading to “significant local and regional variation” in waiting times.

NHS guidance says that patients should begin treatment within four weeks of referral, or within one week for urgent cases.

The latest figures from NHS England, however, show only 71 per cent of children and under 19s referred to the Trust began their treatment within those windows in the 12 months to June, putting its performance below the national average.

In the case of urgent referrals, 54 per cent of patients waited a week or longer to begin their treatment, and 21 per cent of routine case patients waited four or more weeks.

Some patients were left waiting months for help, with four youngsters - one of whom was given an urgent referral - waiting 12 or more weeks.

Overall, referrals are on the up in England, increasing from 5,725 between July 2016 and June 2017 to 7,054 the following year.

In the case of the Avon And Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust , cases rose from 55 to 95 over the same period.

More than a quarter of providers that returned data for the past two years performed worse against their targets this year than they did the previous year.

This is despite government efforts to drive down waiting times, with NHS trusts and other healthcare providers given a deadline of 2020 to ensure they are meeting their targets in at least 95 per cent of cases.

An NHS England spokesperson said: “More young people are getting the treatment they need for eating disorders, and there has been a significant improvement in treatment times for NHS care.

“An extra £30 million is going into children’s eating disorder services every year, with 70 new and improved treatment centres set up in 2017, covering the whole of the country, to ensure more young people get the right care, at the time, closer to home.”