The number of patients admitted to national health service hospitals in Essex and England in each of the last five years is shown in the following table.
Essex England 2003-04 342,596 11,809,017 2004-05 350,506 12,101,986 2005-06 371,713 12,678,628 2006-07 374,850 12,976,273 2007-08 399,921 13,479,828 Notes: 1. The data provided are the number of finished admission episodes for primary care trusts in Essex and for England for the years 2003-04 to 2007-08. 2. The data provided include activity in English NHS hospitals and English NHS commissioned activity in the independent sector. 3. The number of finished admission episodes is not the same as the number of patients admitted as a patient may be admitted more than once. Source: Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), the NHS information centre for health and social care.