A&E Statistics - DOH Quarterly Update, UK

Main Category: Public Health
Article Date: 19 May 2008 - 5:00 PDT

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The following statistics were released by the Department of Health:

Accident and Emergency attendances; total time spent in A&E from arrival to admission, discharge or transfer; and waiting for emergency admission through A&E, quarter ending 31 March 2008

The main findings for the year 2007/08 were:

* Across all A&E types, including those provided by the independent sector (IS), 97.9% of patients spent 4 hours or less from arrival to admission, transfer or discharge. This includes 246,491 attendances at IS provided services. This gives a total of 19.1m attendances at all A&E settings.

The following 2007/08 figures are for comparison with the previous timeseries of data on A&E and do not include independent sector services.

* Across all A&E types provided by the NHS, 97.9% of patients spent 4 hours or less from arrival to admission, transfer or discharge. The figure for last year (2006/07) was 98.2%.

* In 2007/08 the percentage of patients who spent 4 hours or less from arrival to admission, discharge or transfer in major A&E departments only (type 1s) was 97.0%. The figure for last year (2006/07) was 97.5%1.

* There were 18.9 million attendances in 2007/08 at all types of A&E departments provided by the NHS, a 0.2% decrease since 2006/07.

* For major A&E (type 1s) there was a 1.5% decrease in attendances over last year (2006/07).

* Of the 13.4 million patients who attended major A&E (type 1s), 22.6% or 3.0 million needed to be admitted to hospital. Of these, 97.4% were placed in a bed in a ward within 4 hours of a decision to admit. The figure for last year (2006/07) was 98.1%

The main findings for Q4 2007/08 were: (this excludes data from independent sector providers in order to be directly comparable with previous quarters)

- Across all A&E types provided by the NHS, 97.5% of patients spent 4 hours or less from arrival to admission, transfer or discharge. This compares to 97.4% in the previous quarter (Q3 2007/08) and 97.7% for the same quarter last year (Q4 2006/07).

- This quarter the percentage of patients who spent 4 hours or less from arrival to admission, transfer or discharge in major A&E departments only (type 1s) was 96.5% compared to 96.3% in the previous quarter (Q3 2007/08) and 96.8% in the same quarter last year (Q4 2006/07)

- This quarter there were 4.6 million attendances at all types of A&E departments provided by the NHS, a 0.5% decrease from the same quarter last year (Q4 2006/07) and a 2.0% decrease from the previous quarter (Q3 2007/08).

- For major A&E (type 1s) there was a 2.0% decrease in attendances over the same quarter last year (Q4 2006/07) and a 2.3% decrease from the previous quarter (Q3 2007/08).

- Of the 3.2 million patients who attended major A&E departments (type 1s), 23.6% or 0.8 million needed to be admitted to hospital. Of these, 96.5% were placed in a bed in a ward within four hours of a decision to admit. This compares to 97.1% in the same quarter last year (Q4 2006/07).

To view the full hospital activity statistics please click here.

Notes

1. The operational standard is for 98.0% of patients spending 4 hours or less from arrival at A&E to admission, transfer or discharge. This standard is being measured against all types of A&E including Minor Injury Units and Walk in Centres. However prior to April 2003 only the major A&Es performance (type 1s) was published. For comparative purposes the type 1 only figure continues to be published alongside the headline all types figure.

2. For the first time, the data includes services provided by the Independent Sector. For comparison purposes, England level data excluding the IS activity continues to be published.

http://www.dh.gov.uk