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Publication, Part of

NHS Workforce Statistics - March 2022 (Including selected provisional statistics for April 2022)

Official statistics

Publication Date:
30 Jun 2022
Geographic Coverage:
England
Geographical Granularity:
Ambulance Trusts, Care Trusts, Clinical Commissioning Groups, Hospital and Community Health Services, Hospital Trusts, Mental Health Trusts, NHS Trusts, Regions
Date Range:
30 Sep 2009 to 31 Mar 2022

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NHS Workforce Statistics - March 2022 (Including selected provisional statistics for April 2022)

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Introduction
Page contents

Summary

This report shows monthly numbers of NHS Hospital and Community Health Services (HCHS) staff working in NHS Trusts and CCGs in England (excluding primary care staff). Data are available as headcount and full-time equivalents and for all months from 30 September 2009 onwards.

These data are an accurate summary of the validated data extracted from the NHS HR and Payroll system. Additional statistics on staff in NHS Trusts and CCGs and information for NHS Support Organisations and Central Bodies are published each:

September (showing June statistics)

December/January (showing September statistics)

March (showing December statistics)

June (showing March statistics)

Quarterly NHS Staff Earnings, monthly NHS Staff Sickness Absence reports, and data relating to the General Practice workforce and the Independent Healthcare Provider workforce are also available via the Related Links below.

Following feedback from data users, there is a change to the HCHS doctor grades of 'Associate Specialist' and 'Specialty Doctor' in relevant tables in this release. Two new specialty doctor and specialist grades were introduced in April 2021 and both were reported in NHS Digital tables within the 'Specialty Doctor' grade. However, the new specialist grade is more appropriately classified within the 'Associate Specialist' category. Therefore, from March 2022 these are included within the 'Associate Specialist' category and have been removed from the 'Specialty Doctor' category. The March 2022 data in this publication reflects this new approach, and the time series back to April 2021 has also been revised in relevant tables.

An issue has been identified with the provisional data for April 2022, whereby records for a few thousand staff have not been joined correctly in the ESR database. This does not appear to be having a noticeable effect on the data presented in this publication. Further information will be included in the full April 2022 publication, if the issue is not resolved.

We welcome feedback on the methodology and tables within this publication. Please email us with your comments and suggestions, clearly stating Monthly HCHS Workforce as the subject heading, via [email protected] or 0300 303 5678.

Key Facts

Full-Time Equivalent (FTE)

is a standardised measure of the workload of an employed person and allows for the total workforce workload to be expressed in an equivalent number of full-time staff. 1.0 FTE equates to full-time work of 37.5 hours per week, an FTE of 0.5 would equate to 18.75 hours per week.

All NHS Hospital & Community Health Service (HCHS) staff

1,226,677 FTE in March 2022. This is 2.4% (28,930) more than in March 2021.

1,377,387 Headcount in March 2022. This is 2.1% (28,888) more than in March 2021.

Professionally qualified clinical staff*

Professionally qualified clinical staff make up over half (52.8%) of the FTE HCHS workforce.

647,844 FTE in March 2022. This is 3.0% (18,693) more than in March 2021.

 

719,291 Headcount in March 2022. This is 2.7% (19,151) more than in March 2021.

 

* This group includes all HCHS doctors, qualified nurses and health visitors, midwives, qualified scientific, therapeutic and technical staff and qualified ambulance staff.

April 2022 Provisional Statistics

This March 2022 publication includes a Provisional release of a section of the monthly NHS Workforce Statistics publication for April 2022. This contains headline counts at national level of NHS staff numbers for the main staff groups and a detailed view of the Nurses staff group.

Last edited: 30 June 2022 9:34 am