Publication, Part of Statistics on people with a learning disability and autistic people in mental health hospitals
Statistics on people with a learning disability and autistic people in mental health hospitals, AT: September 2026, MHSDS: August 2026
Official statistics, Experimental statistics
Issue with Assuring Transformation data in the Clinical Audit Platform (CAP)
Background
NHS England has identified that due to a technical issue from 16th September onwards, data for a small number of questions in AT on the Clinical Audit Platform (CAP) was not ‘saved’.
Impact on Publication Statistics
The tables impacted within the publication are listed below.
| Table | Section |
| 2.2 | Reason for admission |
| 2.2 | Diagnoses on admission |
| 2.2 | Additional diagnosis since admission |
| 2.3 | Does the patient have someone who supports them to manage their affairs |
Where data was not saved, it is shown in the tables as ‘Not Recorded’. Please note that as AT is a live dataset, data for months prior to September are also impacted where commissioners have updated patient records for these months. The maximum impact is for September 2026 where data for the affected questions for 140 patients was not saved.
Resolution
NHS England has now resolved the issue with AT on CAP so patient records can be updated.
In next month’s publication (November-26), NHS England will publish tables 2.2 and 2.3 with the latest cut of data. This means the months impacted will be refreshed with the latest data including resubmissions made by commissioners.
15 October 2026 09:30 AM
Summary findings from MHSDS
MHSDS main findings - August 2026
At the end of August 2026 (based on hospital spells data):
- There were 3,995 people with a learning disability and autistic people in hospital.
- There were 1,225 admissions and 1,295 discharges. 81% of these were discharged back into the community.
- There were 460,495 referrals¹ for people with a learning disability and/or autistic people.
Of these inpatients:
- 1,095 (27%) had been in hospital for over 2 years.
- There are 1,580 inpatients with a planned discharge date (40%).
- 385 (10%) had a delayed discharge.
- The largest proportion (26%) were aged between 25-34 (1,050).
- The lowest proportion (5%) were aged under 18 (190).
- 67% were male (2,665) and 33% were female (1,300).
Findings based on ward stays data:
- There were 3,985 ward stays reported for the end of the period.
- The largest group of inpatients were in an adult mental health ward (2,365, 59%), followed by a learning disabilities ward (675, 17%).
- 2,555 (64%) were in a non-secure setting². 1,340 (34%) were in a secure setting.
- 425 (11%) travelled over 50km from home to get to the hospital for care or treatment.
- 830 patients were restrained at least once.
1 These include all open referrals without a hospital spell associated with them if the inpatient did not need to stay overnight in hospital.
2 Non-secure wards include inpatients in general wards. Secure wards include patients in low, medium and high secure ward settings.
Last edited: 15 October 2026 4:58 pm