The number of admissions has increased year-on-year from 2000 to 2020. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, hospital admission dropped in 2020/21. In 2023/24 there were around **** million admissions* to NHS hospitals in England, showing that admission numbers have reached and exceeded pre-pandemic levels.

This publication reports on Admitted Patient Care activity in England for the financial year 2022-23. This report includes but is not limited to analysis of hospital episodes by patient demographics, diagnoses, external causes/injuries, operations, bed days, admission method, time waited, specialty, provider level analysis and Adult Critical Care (ACC). It describes NHS Admitted Patient Care Activity, Adult Critical Care activity and performance in hospitals in England. The purpose of this publication is to inform and support strategic and policy-led processes for the benefit of patient care and may also be of interest to researchers, journalists and members of the public interested in NHS hospital activity in England. The data sources for this publication are Hospital Episode Statistics (HES). It contains final data and replaces the provisional data that are released each month. HES contains records of all admissions, appointments and attendances for patients at NHS hospitals in England. The HES data used in this publication are called 'Finished Consultant Episodes', and each episode relates to a period of care for a patient under a single consultant at a single hospital. Therefore, this report counts the number of episodes of care for admitted patients rather than the number of patients. This publication shows the number of episodes during the period, with breakdowns including by patient's age, gender, diagnosis, procedure involved and by provider. Please send queries or feedback via email to enquiries@nhsdigital.nhs.uk. Author: Secondary Care Open Data and Publications, NHS England. Lead Analyst: Emily Michelmore

People aged between 56 and 65 years in the United Kingdom were the most accepting of using technology if it helped them to avoid hospital admissions. Around ** percent of over ** year olds said they would agree to using technology to avoid hospital admission.

This dataset contains estimates of mortality and number of hospital admissions that can be attributed to temperature, from observations and climate projections, and includes some of the underlying climate data. The data are divided into the subdirectories ‘epi_model’, ‘HadUKgrid’, ‘London’, ‘regimes’, and ‘UKCP18’ as follows:

epi_model: - Model fits of exposure-response relationships

HadUKgrid: - Temperature-attributable mortality/hospital admission time series for the observed record (1981/1991-2018) - List of the 10 highest mortality days from 1991 to 2018 based on UK-total temperature-related mortality

London: - Average daily temperature by London boroughs simulated with an urban model, October 2015 to 2019 - Attributable hospital admission by London boroughs based on the above temperature time series

regimes: - Weather regime and pattern classification for the observed record (1850/1979-2019)

UKCP18: - Attributable mortality time series for UKCP18 climate projections (1900-2099)

Further details including file contents and methods can be found in the README.txt files for each dataset. This dataset was produced for the UK Climate Resilience Programme - Addressing the resilience needs of the UK health sector: climate service pilots.

The total number of admissions to private/independent hospitals or clinics in the United Kingdom has increased in 2024 for the ****** consecutive year to ******* episodes, despite the dip in numbers in 2020. Ireland saw the largest growth in terms of percentage increase, with an **** percent increase in 2024 compared to the previous year. England, of course, saw the largest absolute increase in number of admissions in the private sector.

This is a report on admitted patient care activity in English NHS hospitals and English NHS-commissioned activity in the independent sector. This annual publication covers the financial year ending March 2022. It contains final data and replaces the provisional data that are released each month. The data are taken from the Hospital Episodes Statistics (HES) data warehouse. HES contains records of all admissions, appointments and attendances for patients at NHS hospitals in England. The HES data used in this publication are called 'Finished Consultant Episodes', and each episode relates to a period of care for a patient under a single consultant at a single hospital. Therefore this report counts the number of episodes of care for admitted patients rather than the number of patients. This publication shows the number of episodes during the period, with a number of breakdowns including by patient's age, gender, diagnosis, procedure involved and by provider. Hospital Adult Critical Care (ACC) data are now included within this report, following the discontinuation of the 'Hospital Adult Critical Care Activity' publication. The ACC data tables are not a designated National Statistic and they remain separate from the APC data tables. The ACC data used in this publication draws on records submitted by providers as an attachment to the admitted patient care record. These data show the number of adult critical care records during the period, with a number of breakdowns including admission details, discharge details, patient demographics and clinical information. The purpose of this publication is to inform and support strategic and policy-led processes for the benefit of patient care. This document will also be of interest to researchers, journalists and members of the public interested in NHS hospital activity in England. Supplementary analysis has been produced, by NHS Digital, containing experimental statistics using the Paediatric Critical Care Minimum Data Set (PCCMDS) data, collected by NHS Digital, against activity published in NHS Reference Costs. This analysis seeks to assist users of the data in understanding the data quality of reported paediatric critical care data. Also included within this release, is supplementary analysis that has been produced in addition to the Retrospective Review of Surgery for Urogynaecological Prolapse and Stress Urinary Incontinence using Tape or Mesh: Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), Experimental Statistics, April 2008 - March 2017. It contains a count of Finished Consultant Episodes (FCEs) where a procedure for urogynaecological prolapse or stress urinary incontinence using tape or mesh has been recorded during the April 2021 to March 2022 period. Please Note: A summary of information relating to procedures for the treatment of Stress Urinary Incontinence is published here for transparency and scrutiny. Follow up is taking place with individual Trusts to confirm that specific treatment is as described for activity occurring since April 2021. This will lead to more accurate information on these procedures that occurred since April 2021 being being available in the future. In collating this information, it has already become clear that some Trusts mis-coded these procedures in Commissioning Data Set return used to produce these statistics. Alongside this the clinical coding guidance has been refined to enable more accurate identification of specific treatments. The data published here has been published for transparency purposes. However, for these reasons small numbers reported on treatments for this condition should be used as a starting point for further investigation rather than a definitive view.

This dataset consists of information on hospital admissions relating to being obese based on patient's gender and age. Data is taken from the Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) databank produced by NHS Digital.

Crude rate of cost of admissions for alcohol-related conditions (Broad definition) per head of population.

Rationale Alcohol misuse across the UK is a significant public health problem with major health, social, and economic consequences. This indicator aims to highlight the impact of alcohol-related conditions on inpatient hospital services in England. High costs of alcohol-related admissions are indicative of poor population health and high alcohol consumption. This indicator highlights the resource implications of alcohol-related conditions and supports the arguments for local health promotion initiatives. Publication of this indicator will allow national and local cost estimates to be updated and consistently monitored going forward. This measure accounts for just one aspect of the cost of alcohol to society, but there are others such as primary care, crime, ambulatory services, and specialist treatment services as well as broader costs such as unemployment and loss of productivity.

The Government has said that everyone has a role to play in reducing the harmful use of alcohol. This indicator is one of the key contributions by the Government (and the Department of Health and Social Care) to promote measurable, evidence-based prevention activities at a local level, and supports the national ambitions to reduce harm set out in the Government's Alcohol Strategy. This ambition is part of the monitoring arrangements for the Responsibility Deal Alcohol Network. Alcohol-related admissions can be reduced through local interventions to reduce alcohol misuse and harm.

References: (1) PHE (2020) The Burden of Disease in England compared with 22 peer countries https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/global-burden-of-disease-for-england-international-comparisons/the-burden-of-disease-in-england-compared-with-22-peer-countries-executive-summary

Definition of numerator The total cost (£s) of alcohol-related admissions (Broad). Admissions to hospital where the primary diagnosis is an alcohol-related condition, or a secondary diagnosis is an alcohol-related external cause.

More specifically, hospital admissions records are identified where the admission is a finished episode [epistat = 3]; the admission is an ordinary admission, day case or maternity [classpat = 1, 2 or 5]; it is an admission episode [epiorder = 1]; the sex of the patient is valid [sex = 1 or 2]; there is a valid age at start of episode [startage between 0 and 150 or between 7001 and 7007]; the region of residence is one of the English regions, no fixed abode or unknown [resgor <= K or U or Y]; the episode end date [epiend] falls within the financial year, and an alcohol-attributable ICD10 code appears in the primary diagnosis field [diag_01] or an alcohol-related external cause code appears in any diagnosis field [diag_nn].

For each episode identified, an alcohol-attributable fraction is applied to the primary diagnosis field or an alcohol-attributable external cause code appears in one of the secondary codes based on the diagnostic codes, age group, and sex of the patient. Where there is more than one alcohol-related ICD10 code among the 20 possible diagnostic codes, the code with the largest alcohol-attributable fraction is selected; in the event of there being two or more codes with the same alcohol-attributable fraction within the same episode, the one from the lowest diagnostic position is selected. For a detailed list of all alcohol-attributable diseases, including ICD 10 codes and relative risks, see ‘Alcohol-attributable fractions for England: an update’ (2). Alcohol-related hospital admission episodes were extracted from HES according to the Broad definition and admissions flagged as either elective or non-elective based on the admission method field.

The cost of each admission episode was calculated using the National Cost Collection (published by NHS England) main schedule dataset for the corresponding financial year applied to elective and non-elective admission episodes. The healthcare resource group (HRG) was identified using the HES field SUSHRG [SUS Generated HRG], which is the SUS PbR derived HRG code at episode level. Healthcare Resource Groups (HRGs) are standard groupings of clinically similar treatments which use common levels of healthcare resource. The elective admissions were assigned an average of the elective and day-case costs. The non-electives were assigned an average of the non-elective long stay and non-elective short stay costs. Where the HRG was not available or did not match the National Reference Costs look-up table, an average elective or non-elective cost was imputed. This may result in the cost of these admissions being underestimated. For each record, the AAF was multiplied by the reference cost and the resulting values were aggregated by the required output geographies to provide numerators for the cost per capita indicator.

References: (2) PHE (2020) Alcohol-attributable fractions for England: an update https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/alcohol-attributable-fractions-for-england-an-update

Definition of denominator Mid-year population estimates.

Caveats Not all alcohol-related conditions require inpatient services, so this indicator is only one measure of the alcohol-related health problems in each local area. However, inpatient admissions are easily monitored, and this indicator provides local authorities with a routine method of monitoring the health impacts of alcohol in their local populations.

The Healthcare Resource Group cost assigned to each hospital admission is for the initial admission episode only and doesn’t include costs related to alcohol in any subsequent episodes in the hospital spell. Where the HRG was not available or did not match the National Reference Costs look-up table, an average elective or non-elective cost was imputed. This may result in the cost of these admissions being underestimated. It must be noted that the numerator is based on the financial year and the denominator on calendar mid-year population estimates, e.g., 2019/20 admission rates are constructed from admission counts for the 2019/20 financial year and mid-year population estimates for the 2020 calendar year. Data for England includes records with geography 'No fixed abode'. Alcohol-attributable fractions were not available for children. Conditions where low levels of alcohol consumption are protective (have a negative alcohol-attributable fraction) are not included in the calculation of the indicator. This does not include attendance at Accident and Emergency departments. Hospital Episode Statistics overall is well completed. However, year-on-year variations exist due to poor completion from a proportion of trusts.

Analysis has revealed significant differences across the country in the coding of cancer patients in the Hospital Episode Statistics. In particular, in some areas, regular attenders at hospital for treatments like chemotherapy and radiotherapy are being incorrectly recorded as ordinary or day-case admissions. Since cancer admissions form part of the overarching alcohol-related admission national indicators, the inconsistent recording across the country for cancer patients has some implication for these headline measures.

Cancer admissions make up approximately a quarter of the total number of alcohol-related admissions. Analysis suggests that, although most Local Authorities would remain within the same RAG group compared with the England average if cancer admissions were removed, the ranking of Local Authorities within RAG groups would be altered. We are continuing to monitor the impact of this issue and to consider ways of improving the consistency between areas. The COVID-19 pandemic had a large impact on hospital activity with a reduction in admissions in 2020 to 2021. Because of this, NHS Digital has been unable to analyse coverage (measured as the difference between expected and actual records submitted by NHS Trusts) in the normal way. There may have been issues around coverage in some areas which were not identified as a result.

Counts and rates of deaths and hospital admissions associated with temperature for England and Wales from 2001 to 2020.

In 2015/16 there were approximately 2.36 million adults admitted to hospital in England due to an illness caused by smoking. By 2022/23 the number of hospital admissions as a result of smoking had increased to approximately 2.54 million, the largest number during the provided time period. Smoking prevalence across age groups in England In England in 2022, 21 percent of men and 15 percent of women aged between 25 and 34 years were current smokers. This is the highest share of male smokers across the age groups, while the age group of 45 to 54 years had the second-largest proportion of female smokers at 18 percent. Situation north of the border In Scotland, the share of regular smokers was quite evenly distributed among all ages, except for those aged over 75 years who were smoking less. In 2023, 16 percent of men and 13 percent of women overall in Scotland were current smokers. 

During the financial year 2023/24, the busiest hospital provider in England was the ************************************************ with over *** thousand admissions. This trust encompasses four hospitals in the Birmingham area, one of the largest urban areas in England. The second-busiest trust this year was the ******************************************, with approximately *** thousand admissions. Accident and emergency admissionsFrom April to June 2023, there were around *** million accident and emergency (A&E) attendees (including at A&E departments not in hospitals) in England. After the drop in A&E attendances during the COVID-pandemic, numbers have risen again to previous levels, with a trend towards an increasing number of individuals seeking emergency care. Over ***** percent of A&E attendees in England in 2022/23 were first diagnosed with a sprained ankle, knee, wrist, or foot, and over **** percent were diagnosed with a respiratory infection. Furthermore, *** percent were found to have ‘no abnormality detected’ which could be detrimental to a service that is already stretched. Waiting too longOver the last few years in the A&E department, the NHS has been falling behind the target that ** percent of patients should be seen within **** hours of arrival. The last time this target was reached was back in July 2015. Not just the A&E department, but other services also require lengthy waits. It is no wonder that the ******** of respondents surveyed were fairly or very dissatisfied with the length of wait for many aspects of NHS care. Moreover, in general, levels of satisfaction with the way NHS runs is at an all-time low.

This dataset consists of information on hospital admissions relating to being obese based on geographical distribution. Data is taken from the Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) databank produced by NHS Digital.

Directly age and sex standardised admission rate for emergency admissions for acute conditions that should not usually require hospital admission per 100,000 registered patients, 95% confidence intervals (CI). March 2022 - The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic began to have an impact on Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) data late in the 2019-20 financial year, which continued into the 2020-21 financial year. This means we are seeing different patterns in the submitted data, for example, fewer patients being admitted to hospital, and therefore statistics which contain data from this period should be interpreted with care. Further information is available in the annual HES publication: https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/hospital-admitted-patient-care-activity/2020-21/covid-19-impact As of the October 2020 release, the CCG OIS is now published on an annual basis, as a result provisional data periods will no longer be published. The annual update will be based on finalised data for the April to March reporting period each year. As of the March 2020 release, the data included in the December 2019 publication for the 2018/19, July 2018 to June 2019 (Provisional) and October 2018 to September 2019 (Provisional) data periods has been revised. This is due to a revision of a large proportion of records for East Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust (RXC) which had missing information for the condition the patient was in hospital for and other conditions the patients suffer from. The revised data for these reporting periods also differs from that originally published in December 2019 in that the HES database is routinely updated (overwritten) on a monthly basis for the year in progress. Data for the two provisional periods remain provisional, but is now more complete than it was when the December 2019 publication was released. This effect cannot be readily separated from the effect of the East Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust (RXC) resubmission which also took place after processing for the December 2019 publication. Legacy unique identifier: P01844

Public Health England (PHE) has published the Local Alcohol Profiles for England (LAPE) data update for May 2016.

The LAPE interactive tool presents data for 25 alcohol-related indicators and allows users to view and analyse data in a user-friendly format. The http://www.lape.org.uk" class="govuk-link">LAPE website also provides links to further supporting and relevant information to aid understanding of alcohol-related harm in a local population.

http://fingertips.phe.org.uk/profile/local-alcohol-profiles" class="govuk-link">View the Local Alcohol Profiles for England data tool

This latest data release includes:

• the addition of 2014 to 2015 data to the alcohol-related hospital admission indicators
• 3 new indicators showing alcohol-related admissions by age
• a new indicator relating to alcohol-related cancer incidence

This dataset provides counts of Finished Admission Episodes (FAE) at MSOA level and higher geographies. The information covers the following specified diagnosis, cause and operative procedures: 1) Coronary Heart Disease; 2) Cerbrovascular Disease (including Stroke); 3) Cancer (excluding non-melanoma skin cancer); 4) Falls (basic accidental falls); 5) Coronary Artery Bypass Graft (CABG) and Percutaneous Transluminal Coronary Angioplasty (PTCA) (Heart); 6) Hip Replacement; 7) Knee Replacement; 8) Cataracts. Source: The Information Centre for health and social care (IC) Publisher: Neighbourhood Statistics Geographies: Local Authority District (LAD), Government Office Region (GOR), National Geographic coverage: England Time coverage: 2004/05 to 2007/08 Type of data: Administrative data

This statistic displays the number of emergency hospital admissions for asthma in the United Kingdom (UK) in the period June 2013 to May 2014, by age. The highest number of emergency admissions for asthma was in the 0 to 9 years age group, with over 16 thousand emergency hospital admissions.

This dataset provides counts of Finished Admission Episodes (FAE) broken down by age group (0-64 years and 65+ years) and sex at LA level and higher geographies. The information covers the following specified diagnosis, cause and operative procedures: 1) Coronary Heart Disease; 2) Cerbrovascular Disease (including Stroke); 3) Cancer (excluding non-melanoma skin cancer); 4) Falls (basic accidental falls); 5) Coronary Artery Bypass Graft (CABG) and Percutaneous Transluminal Coronary Angioplasty (PTCA) (Heart); 6) Hip Replacement; 7) Knee Replacement; 8) Cataracts. Source: The Information Centre for health and social care (IC) Publisher: Neighbourhood Statistics Geographies: Local Authority District (LAD), Government Office Region (GOR), National Geographic coverage: England Time coverage: 2004/05 to 2007/08 Type of data: Administrative data

Finished consultant episodes for dental caries among children aged 0 to 5, rate per 100,000.Following Census 2021, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) carried out reconciliation and rebasing of the mid year population estimates (MYE) it produces. This process happens every 10 years following the census. The official population estimates for mid 2012 to mid 2020 have been revised, to incorporate the data now available from Census 2021. The data for this indicator has been revised to use the rebased population estimates from 2012 onwards.RationaleDental caries (tooth decay) and periodontal (gum) disease are the most common dental pathologies in the UK. Tooth decay has become less common over the past two decades, but is still a significant health and social problem. It results in destruction of the crowns of teeth and frequently leads to pain and infection. Dental disease is more common in deprived areas, compared to affluent, communities. The indicator is a good direct measure of dental health and an indirect, proxy measure of child health and diet.Definition of numeratorFinished consultant episodes for all persons aged 0 to5 years with primary operation F09 or F10 and primary diagnosis codesK021, K025, K028, K029, K040, K045, K046 or K047.Definition of denominatorLocal authority figures: Mid-year population estimates: Single year of age and sex for local authorities in England and Wales; estimated resident population (ages 0-5 years). Commencing April 2014, geographical references are taken from 2011 census information.

Caveats No assumptions can be made about the method of anaesthesia provided for these procedures, but it is likely that the majority of episodes involved general anaesthetic. It is possible that different coding protocols are applied in some sites, which could explain some of the variation. In some instances, the data are an underestimate of the number of episodes, as the Community Dental Service may provide the extraction service in hospital premises, but the episodes may not be included in hospital data recording.

Important: NHS Digital identified a data quality issue affecting HES data for East Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust (RXC) in 2018/19. Approximately 85,000 records erroneously had all diagnosis and procedure codes removed. Therefore, PHE did not publish values for indicators based on HES data for areas that had more than 10% of patients from that area with missing codes from RXC in 2018/19. Areas with 1–10% of patients with missing codes from RXC have been flagged to be treated with caution. For more details, see HES Data Quality Notes.

Important: NHS England identified a data quality issue affecting Frimley Health Foundation Trust in 2022–2023. The Trust did not submit HES data for June 2022 to March 2023. Therefore, values have not been published based on HES data for areas that had over 10% of hospital patients from an area treated at Frimley Health Foundation Trust in 2021–2022. Areas with 1–10% of patients treated at the Trust in 2021–2022 have been flagged to be treated with caution.

In 2023, NHS England announced a requirement for Trusts to report Same Day Emergency Care (SDEC) to the Emergency Care Data Set (ECDS) by July 2024. Early adopter sites began reporting SDEC to ECDS from 2021/22, with other Trusts changing their reporting in 2022/23 or 2023/24. Some Trusts had previously reported this activity as part of the Admitted Patient Care data set. Moving to ECDS may reduce the number of admissions reported for this indicator. NHSE has advised that it is not currently possible to accurately identify SDEC in existing data flows. The impact of the change is expected to vary by diagnosis, with indicators related to injuries and external causes potentially most affected.

When considering whether SDEC recording practice has reduced the number of admissions reported for this indicator at the local level, please refer to the list of sites reporting SDEC to ECDS.

Daily hospital admissions to University Hospitals Leicester (UHL) of patients with Covid-19.Please note automatic updates to this dataset was discontinued on the 8th December 2023.