Provisional Monthly Hospital Episode Statistics for Admitted Patient Care, Outpatients and Accident and Emergency Data - April 2012 to September 2012

Monthly HES data for Inpatients

In the year from October 2011 to September 2012 there were:

• 17.7 million finished consultant episodes (FCEs)², 59.6 per cent (10.5 million) of which included at least one procedure or intervention, and 6.0 million of which were day cases.

• 15.1 million finished admission episodes (FAEs)³, of which 5.3 million were emergency admissions.

Monthly HES - Inpatient Clinical coding coverage

The shortfall between the most recent month's data is more pronounced when considering clinical (procedures and diagnoses) coverage. 3.9 per cent more procedures and 7.2 per cent more diagnoses were coded in the HES data submitted to SUS by 22/11/2012 (Month 7) - extract used for this publication, compared to the HES data submitted to SUS by 19/10/2012 (Month 6) used for 7th December 2012 publication. We accordingly recommend extra caution using clinical codes for the most recent months data.

Monthly HES for Outpatients

In the year from October 2011 to September 2012 there were:

• 91.7 million outpatient appointments made, with 73.5 million (80.1 per cent) of these attended by the patient.

• 6.7 million outpatient appointments not attended by the patient, representing 7.3 per cent of all appointments.

Provisional Monthly HES data for Accident and Emergency (Experimental Data)

In the year from October 2011 to September 2012 there were:

• 18.1 million A&E attendances³ recorded in A&E HES. Of these 3.7 million (20.7 per cent) resulted in admission to hospital for inpatient treatment, 3.6 million (20.0 per cent) resulted in a GP follow up, and 7.0 million (38.9 per cent) were discharged with no follow-up.

TOI: Assaults

In the period October 2011 to September 2012:

• Assaults accounted for 35,655 finished admission episodes (FAEs), a 11.0 per cent decrease on the previous 12-month period  when there were 40,072 FAEs. Overall admissions increased 1.9 per cent over the same period.

• The biggest fall in FAEs due to assault occurred in the South East Coast SHA (15.8 per cent) followed by the South West SHA (14.5 per cent).

• Assault by bodily force (22,976) accounted for the highest number of assault admissions. The next largest group -measured by number of admissions - was assault by sharp object (4,121). For the majority of assault types the number of admissions is less than one hundred.

• North West Strategic Health Authority had the highest rate of admissions for assaults per 100,000 of all FAEs,  irrespective of gender. The South East Coast had the lowest rate of admissions for males whilst the East of England had the lowest rate of admissions for females.

• FAEs due to assault are far more common amongst males than females. Males represented 82.5 per cent of all such admissions.

• Assault admissions by age follow a similar trend for both genders: there is a peak amongst young adults between the ages of 18 and 25, the number of admissions then steadily decreases as age increases. Although the trends for both genders are similar, the much higher number of male admissions causes the peak for young adult males to be far more pronounced.

• There were a total of 174,984 A&E attendances as a result of assault, a 5.9 per cent decrease on the previous 12 months. Overall A&E Attendances increased 8.0 per cent over the same period.