Statistical Press Notice: A&E Statistics - Quarterly Update, UK

Main Category: Public Health
Article Date: 18 May 2009 - 3:00 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 and year ending 31 March 2009

The main findings for the year 2008/09 were:

- Across all A&E types, 98.1% of patients spent 4 hours or less from arrival to admission, transfer or discharge. This compares to 97.9% in 2007/08.

- In 2008/09 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 97.2%. This compares to 97.0%1 in 2007/08.

- There were 19.6 million attendances in 2008/09 at all types of A&E departments, a 2.4% increase since 2007/08.

- For major A&E (type 1s) there was a 0.2% increase in attendances over last year (2007/08).

- Of the 13.4 million patients who attended major A&E (type 1s), 23.9% or 3.2 million needed to be admitted to hospital. Of these, 97.7% were placed in a bed in a ward within 4 hours of a decision to admit. The figure for last year (2007/08) was 97.4%.

The main findings for Q4 2008/09 were:

- Across all A&E types, 97.7% of patients spent 4 hours or less from arrival to admission, transfer or discharge - the best ever performance in Q4. This compares to 97.5% in the previous quarter (Q3 2008/09) and 97.5% for the same quarter last year (Q4 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 96.8% compared to 96.4% in the previous quarter (Q3 2008/09) and 96.5% in the same quarter last year (Q4 2007/08).

- This quarter there were 4.8 million attendances at all types of A&E departments, a 4.1% increase from the same quarter last year (Q4 2007/08) and a 1.2% decrease from the previous quarter (Q3 2008/09).

- For major A&E (type 1s) there was a 2.1% increase in attendances over the same quarter last year (Q4 2007/08) and a 1.7% decrease from the previous quarter (Q3 2008/09).

- Of the 3.3 million patients who attended major A&E departments (type 1s), 25.0% or 0.8 million needed to be admitted to hospital. Of these, 97.1% were placed in a bed in a ward within four hours of a decision to admit. This compares to 96.5% in the same quarter last year (Q4 2007/08).

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

Source
Department of Health, UK

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