Statistical Press Notice: Accident And Emergency Statistics - Quarterly Update, UK

Main Category: Public Health
Article Date: 17 Aug 2008 - 0:00 PDT

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The following statistics were released today by the Department of Health:

Accident and Emergency attendances; total time spent in A&E (Accident and Emergency) from arrival to admission, discharge or transfer; and waiting for emergency admission through A&E, quarter ending 30 June 2008

The main findings for Q1 2008/09 (including those provided by the independent sector) were:

-- Across all A&E types, 98.3% of patients spent 4 hours or less from arrival to admission, transfer or discharge. This compares to 97.5% in the previous quarter (Q4 2007/08) and 98.3% for the same quarter last year (Q1 2007/08).

-- 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 97.6% compared to 96.5% in the previous quarter (Q4 2007/08) and 97.6% in the same quarter last year (Q1 2007/08).

-- This quarter there were 4.9 million attendances at all types of A&E departments, no change from the same quarter last year (Q1 2007/08) and a 6.9% increase from the previous quarter (Q4 2007/08).

-- For major A&E (type 1s) there was a 1.2% decrease in attendances over the same quarter last year (Q1 2007/08) and a 6.0% increase from the previous quarter (Q4 2007/08).

-- Of the 3.4 million patients who attended major A&E departments (type 1s), 22.6% or 0.8 million needed to be admitted to hospital. Of these, 98.1% were placed in a bed in a ward within four hours of a decision to admit. This compares to 98.0% in the same quarter last year (Q1 2007/08).

Link to Hospital Activity Statistics

There have been technical issues with preparing the revised data for 2007/08. To avoid delaying the quarterly release of A&E figures, these will be published as soon as the problems have been resolved.

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.

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

Department of Health