Accident and Emergency Attendances in England (Experimental Statistics), 2010-11

This is the fourth publication of the accident and emergency (A&E;) attendance data within Hospital Episode Statistics (HES). It covers the period from April 2010 to March 2011 and draws on just over 16 million detailed records of attendances at major A&E; departments, single specialty A&E; departments, walk-in centres and minor injury units in England.

Publishing A&E; HES data, as experimental statistics, enables initial conclusions to be presented for discussion and aims to promote and highlight the uses of this potentially rich dataset.

During the period covered by this publication, not all providers have completed data submissions and data quality is poor in some cases. The publication also includes analysis of the A&E; HES data compared to the Quarterly Monitoring of Accident and Emergency (QMAE) return, the official source of A&E; information, to highlight areas for further investigation.

Key facts

In 2010-11:

• A&E; HES data contains over 16.2 million accident and emergency attendances from April 2010 to March 2011 at major A&E; departments, single specialty A&E; departments, walk-in centres and minor injury units in England.
• Data is incomplete; there are 15.8 million attendances reported in A&E; HES (excluding planned follow-up appointments), compared to 21.4 million reported in Quarterly Monitoring of Accident and Emergency (QMAE) aggregate data for the equivalent period.
• There are 187 providers with attendances in A&E; HES compared to 327 providers that have submitted A&E; attendances via QMAE. QMAE has seen an increase in the number of walk in centres and minor injury units which currently do not submit to HES.
• Of the 140 providers that do not submit A&E; data to HES, 77 are primary care trusts (PCTs), 6 are trusts, 2 are Care Trusts and 55 are Other (incl. walk in centres, minor injury units and private providers).
• 44.0% (7.2 million) of all A&E; attendances were for patients aged 29 or under, 16.2% (2.6 million) were for patients aged 20-29. Just over half of these (51%) were male.
• 25.8% (4.2 million) of all arrivals at A&E; were by ambulance or helicopter, compared to 25.2% (3.9 million) of all arrivals in 2009-10.
• 59.6% (9.7 million) of all attendances at A&E; had a valid diagnosis code and 12.4% (2.0 million) of all attendances had a diagnosis of 'Diagnosis not classifiable' recorded.
• 74.7% (12.1 million) of all attendances had a valid treatment code and 27.1% (4.4 million) of all attendances had a recorded treatment of 'guidance/advice only'.
• 57.4% (9.3 million) of all attendances were discharged ('GP follow-up required' or 'no follow-up required') and 21.9% (3.6 million) of all attendances were admitted to hospital.

Detailed analysis of A&E; attendances at provider level is available within the supporting excel document [A&E; Attendances - Provider level analysis (Experimental statistics) 2010-11]. This report provides comparisons for 3 providers. A provider can be specified as England, a Strategic Health Authority or individual providers allowing comparison at England, SHA and provider levels.

The information presented within this report has been extracted from accident and emergency data submitted to HES (Hospital Episode Statistics). Where a provider is not listed this is because data has not been submitted to A&E; HES.

Also provided within Table 17 of the main report are provider level comparisons relating to coverage between A&E; HES and QMAE.

Responsible statistician

The responsible statistician for this publication is Tony Childs, Principal Information Analyst HES/SUS ([email protected], 0845 300 6016).

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